Ever wonder why IKEA is such a respected and admired company? Its simple things like this that makes it happen.

Since IKEA stopped giving away free plastic bags – you either bring your own or buy one of their giant blue bags for 59 cents – the results have been dramatic.

Until March 2007, the company’s customers were using 70 million bags in the U.S. alone. That’s when IKEA started charging 5 cents per disposable bag. Hoping to cut consumption of the bags by 50 percent — to 35 million bags — IKEA was pleased when usage dropped instead to 6 million bags, said spokesperson Mona Astra Liss.

“The largest majority of customers were very pleased that we were giving them an opportunity to do something to be socially responsible,” Liss said.

IKEA won’t say how many of the big blue bags it sold last year – that, it seems, is proprietary information — but the company said sales of those bags increased tenfold. IKEA dropped plastic bags last year in the U.K. and Australia.

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