Glad vs. Hefty

Glad ForceFlex vs. Hefty Ultra Flex

As you can guess from the product names, "flex" is the new byword in the otherwise staid garbage bag category. In the last few years, both Glad and Hefty have rolled out premium-priced, reinforced plastic trash bags that ostensibly reduce rips and tears and can handle heavier loads of garbage. The selling point of Glad ForceFlex (*Est. $6 for a box of 20 13-gallon bags) is its diamond-patterned texture, which the manufacturer says stretches around giant chunks of trash and can be stuffed with "just about anything." Hefty, meanwhile, touts the "interlocking texture design" and "puncture protection" of its Ultra Flex trash bags (*Est. $10 for box of 38 13-gallon bags) , and says they're 20 percent thicker than "most other" trash bags.

These are the kinds of fighting words that should make scores of reviewers rush to store shelves and test these claims for themselves -- but only Consumer Reports takes up the gauntlet, stuffing equally sized Glad ForceFlex and Hefty Ultra Flex bags with hardbound books and wire hangers and hanging them off the ground. One brand does much better than another, but Consumer Reports notes that (for most ordinary uses) house brands like America's Choice, which cost as little as 10¢ per bag, are just a better value.

Unfortunately, Consumer Reports is the only national publication that directly compares Glad ForceFlex and Hefty Ultra Flex. In its December 2004 roundup, Real Simple uses comparably severe methodology -- editors filled bags with trash and sharp-edged boxes, dragged them over jagged rocks and smooth concrete, and dropped them from a height of five feet. However, Hefty Ultra Flex (which seemed not to have hit the market yet) wasn't included. Glad ForceFlex emerges as a top pick; editors call it "surprisingly hardy for its size and light weight," an assessment that's contradicted in some other reviews.

Puzzled, we dug a bit deeper into the whole Glad ForceFlex vs. Hefty Ultra Flex debate. A test by KETV in Omaha pitted Glad ForceFlex against the Target house brand; the ForceFlex bags popped a few holes. On Associated Content, two separate reviewers, in two separate articles, compare these bags; one says Glad has "more sturdy" drawstrings, while the other says Hefty has "more reliable" drawstrings (both reviewers are positive about the bags overall, but they clearly didn't put them through any torture tests). A writer for The Impulsive Buy says he climbed into a Glad ForceFlex bag and hopped up and down "like a rabbit on crack" for several minutes (it didn't break), while a consumer reporter for an NBC TV affiliate asked a group of panelists to evaluate the Glad bags; seven out of nine profess themselves satisfied.

Finally, we turned to consumer reviews on Epinions and Yahoo! Answers. Here's where we found a possible explanation -- or, at any rate, a confirmation -- of the disparate results reported by Consumer Reports and Real Simple. Of the dozen or so owners (each) on Epinions who report their experiences with Glad ForceFlex and Hefty Ultra Flex, about two-thirds have nothing but good things to say, while the remainder gives one-star pans, complaining about punctures, rips and tears. Is it possible that some batches of ForceFlex and Ultra Flex passed inspection, while others have quality control problems?

Since the most credible review we found tips the scales in favor of Hefty Ultra Flex over Glad ForceFlex, we've included the Hefty trash bags in ConsumerSearch Fast Answers as the best "reinforced" plastic bag, with the proviso that many reviewers aren't convinced that its extra strength and flexibility justifies its price of about 30¢ per bag.

One other supermarket brand that receives attention from reviewers is Hefty Cinch Sak (*Est. $6 for box of 22 13-gallon bags) . Real Simple rates this trash bag second to Glad ForceFlex in the 13-gallon kitchen category, saying it's not quite as strong and its drawstring handles stretch under heavy loads; however, the magazine does rate Cinch Sak trash bags tops for heavy-duty lawn and leaf bags. Meanwhile, a reviewer for Associated Content concedes that Hefty Cinch Sak is stronger than America's Choice (the house brand of Wal-Mart), but isn't worth the higher price. For these reasons, we didn't include Hefty Cinch Sak in ConsumerSearch Fast Answers.