What: Walmart is making progress towards finding sustainable alternatives to single-use plastic bags.

Why it is important: Single-use plastic bags are an issue that almost all IADS mentioned that they are trying to reduce. Walmart offers some interesting programs to promotion reducing and reusing.

A Walmart store in Santa Clara, California piloted a solution called Fill It Forward that lets customers scan a tag on their reusable bags each time they use them to accumulate points, which then convert into monetary donations to a local organization.

Another store in Mountain View, California, piloted Goatote, which lets customers "check out" reusable bags via an app that are free if returned within 30 days or cost USD 2 if customers keep them.

Many cities and states in the US have started to ban single-use plastic bags, an ordinance that already exists in most of Europe and other parts of the world.

How Walmart is testing sustainable bags