I don't know if lunchboxes are in or out now, but I can tell you that in 1978, you could take my Hulk lunchbox, provided you pried it from my cold, dead hands.

I had a Knight Rider lunch box with included thermos.

Wish I still had it so I could take my lunch to work in it tomorrow.

I always thought lunchboxes are collectables nowadays. Never know any kid actually carrying them.

Space 1999 baby!

My lunchbox growing up was a Tupperware container. It wasn't pretty but it did the job.

Metal lunchbox suck. They get bent easy and the paint gets scratched. They look like s**t in no time.

I disagree on getting rid of lunch boxes. Packing in paper just creates more waste; aren't we supposed to be conserving? A simple lunch kit (not the expensive bento boxes, but a non-branded or inexpensive lunch box and a sandwich container) saves waste. If my kid takes 180 lunches to school this year (he won't, because of medical appointments and the like, but with an extreme amount of missed school, that's 150-160 lunches at least), 180 paper bags and baggies will probably cost slightly less than what his lunch box did ($9 for an insulated, patterned lunch box with a water bottle and an insulating wrap - we already had sandwich boxes), but where's all that waste going to end up? Times several hundred students packing lunches? A lunch box is reusable, while paper bags and plastic wrappings just end up in the trash.

Of course I've seen kids to go school with their lunch in bento boxes! I was in Japan at the time, does that count?

@katoninetales: 150% agree. Why not use a lunch box that you can use over, and over, and over again? Why keep buying paper bags and then throwing them in the trash. Besides, I think a lunch box is totally rad. But I definitely wouldn't pay 35 dollars for one, that's crazy.

I'm a grad student and I bring my lunch in a lunchbox. One of the soft Thermos-brand ones with the second compartment for keeping my sandwich from getting squished. I'm not the least bit embarrassed, it saves me squished sandwiches and tons of lunch money!

@BroScience: Reusable lunchboxes only work if the kid brings them home each day. Is there any way to tether it to the kid? We reuse store plastic bags as lunch bags.

The Real Ghostbusters all the way, complete with thermos.

I have a soft-sided mini cooler that I use. Cost about the same as as lunchbox, has a strap, and folds up smaller when you're done with it to fit into a bag.

@katoninetales: I was thinking the same about the paper bag. I used to have plastic lunch boxes growing up. The ones that lasted for a few years at the very least. And they were cheap too (as evidenced by the fact that my mom bought them)

I remember that when I was a little'n we used a plain colored soft sided coleman insulated mini cooler type thing. Seemed to work pretty well.

@katstermonster: I work in a conservative office, and I do the same thing.

NFL lunchbox for me, with the AFC on one side, and the NFC on the other.

Classic

I have my original Dukes of Hazzard lunchbox, and matching Thermos still. My kids? They just use the softside/insulated things as mentioned above. They are a solid color and flatten nicely for the ride home.

Some schools no longer allow metal lunchboxes, because you can use them as clubs. My sister got excited seeing red lunchbags at Target last week. "Makes you wish you had a gaggle of 8-year olds to send off to school, huh?" I asked her. "No, not really," she replied.

@ludwigk: Breakfast Club 1985.

All I remember of my bagging lunch days in school is wrapping my can of soda in aluminum foil, THAT can't be good for the environment!

Last year, 5th grade, my daughter carried her King Kong lunchbox proudly. Now she has it on her shelf to hold her treasures. This year she has a soft-insulated red & black pack. When I do lunch duty I would say that most of the kids bring lunchboxes of some sort.

[www.kaboodle.com]

While the lunchbox may not be a lie, the Twinkie IS:

Our 5 year old daughter didn't like the pink soft-sided zippered bag we got her, so she saved her pennies and got exactly what she wanted - a nice pink soft-sided zippered bag with a picture of a pony on it.

Target has lunchboxes at 30% off now. probably'll be 75% off in a few weeks.

@katoninetales: I think you mistake "we" with "everyone" because most people couldn't care less about conservation when Junior forgets to bring home his lunchbox at the end of the day, or loses it, or swaps it with his friend's plastic sack because it looked cooler, or someone made fun of him for his lunchbox and he hates it because it ruined his 1st grade life.

@ChuckECheese: Have they seen the plastic lunchboxes that are nearly just as hard? Seriously, lunchboxes as clubs are no more deadly than someone going up to bat with a large textbook and your head as the ball.

@katoninetales: I agree - this is wasteful. However, Ihaveasmartpuppy has a point. Your kid has to be responsible.

@Ihaveasmartpuppy: Store plastic bags are a no-no for the world, sorry. You should be using cloth bags to buy groceries.

@Bhockzer: Same here. Ecto-Cooler in tow.

@Laines: As for $-saving, I never buy the little single servings packs of snacks and food. "Baggies" brand, with the twist-ties, are the cheapest I've found so I always buy the regular size crackers and fruit and stuff like that and pack it up. This year my daughter has taken on that job and she chooses and packs the non-perishables the night before as part of her chores.

Wait just one hot minute-

Why are there zippos in that picture? I guess if we're talking about 6th graders, it makes sense for them to be sparking their J's with a Zippo, but a 4th grader? C'mon, they'd be using a plastic Bic....

@pecan 3.14159265: The other day my daughter turned quickly and I got slammed by her backpack. It hurt big. I'm still waiting for the "kids' backpacks are too heavy" article the newspeople always crow every September.

@katoninetales: brown paper bags are recyclable though, at least in these parts. you just throw it in the mixed paper box at the office (and yes I did brown bag a PB&J almost every day when I was doing research work in grad school)
@bornonbord: What you say is true: but if i didn't get store plastic bags, what would my kitty litter get thrown out in? it is after all "reuse, reduce, recycle"

@bornonbord: What you say is true: Groceries? You should be growing your own food at home.

Hey Phil? When you pack your kids' lunches then get back to us on how it's no big deal if the PB&J gets squashed all over the inside of their backpacks. In the meantime, this is just another Consumerist "let us talk out of our asses" article.

@katoninetales: I have seen kids use bento boxes (or at least "laptop lunchboxes" which are sort of Americanized kiddie bentos) ... and lunchboxes/reuseable lunch bags are DEFINITELY in ... for the waste issue!

My sainted mom would visit thrift stores to fetch her whelp cool retro Man From UNCLE, Green Hornet and Six Million Dollar Man lunch pails. That was one kid riding high every primary school lunch break!
(Not so cool (at that age): retro shirts)

@ChuckECheese: Yeah, a bunch of mother's got crazy in the early 1980's about kids using lunch boxes as weapons so they ran up a petition against the metal boxes.

Oh, and this was right before kids started to bring actual real GUNS to school when crack cocaine use/sales hit America. Really did alot of good didn't it to ban metal lunch boxes...

Former owner of the following 1970's lunch boxes:
Korg (a Saturday morning caveman tv show)
Land of the Lost (Kroff Supershow)
Metric System (I was either a geek or Mom waited too long to buy a new lunch box so that is all the store had left.)
Evil Knievel (very cool)

@Trai_Dep: Oh, wait, I'm unsure if Green Hornet was one I wanted and didn't get, or if I scored on... But Steve Austin and Illya Kuryakin watched over my PB&Js with laserlike focus!

@Smashville_makes his own comments at home: I grow my own food and my own grocery bags at home.

I still have my old plastic Transformers lunchbox from the 80's. <3 It doubles as an art supply kit.

Hmmmm. I know a *bunch* of people who send their kids to school with their lunches in a bento box and who have fun making fun shapes with the food in the boxes. psst: This, from what they tell me, has the side effect of making the kids more interested in the food and they actually eat it.

I don't know how strenuously the author of the article looked for bento boxes in the lunchroom, but I can't think that it was a very comprehensive effort.

(Nope, I'm not a disgruntled bento user. My kid's not even old enough for school yet. I just don't get what the point of telling people who are using a product that works for them and gets their kids to eat their lunches, try new foods, and eat a wider variety of foods than they would otherwise not to do what they're doing or implying that they're self-indulgent or wasteful for doing so.)

@stanner: You know you could've probably just ironed on a pony to the side of the bag.

I'm a lover of bento boxes, actually. I have my own set, and we have a collection of lots of other bits and pieces for my daughter. I got one on a whim years ago for her, and it kind of snowballed from there.

She used one bento box for the entire year of kindergarten. I got a double-layered one with fork and spoon built right in for about $15 including shipping. It was the perfect size for her lunch...I could fit a whole sandwich, cut into 4ths in the bottom layer, and two sides in the top. So I didn't have to worry about buying plastic baggies or containers, just a quick wash every afternoon. She used a little insulated bag I already had, and all I had to do was add a juice box and Little Debbie.

She's in 4th grade this year, and while we got a nice insulated lunch box for her with a water bottle holster, we still use bento boxes. She packs her own lunch now, but the bento boxes are a godsend for her portion control. If I gave her a baggie and told her to get some cookies, she'd probably fill it to the top. But since only 4 will fit in the bento, that's all she takes.

@sponica: Brown paper bags are NOT recyclable if they have food stains. If you can keep a fourth grader from getting food stains on their paper lunch bag, I bow to you.

Not only is your child unlikely to bring a paper or plastic bag home for re-use or recycling, I fail to see how paper bags are money saving. If you use 180 paper bags a year, you're going to be spending more than the cost of a lunchbox (or reusable lunch bag) annually.

Often in college, esp. for thinner text books, it was cheaper for a group of us to pitch in and buy one book - then make photocopies.

@usagi32211: If people would buy real bento boxes and not those 'environmentally friendly' laptop lunch things, they wouldn't be so expensive. Mine was roughly $10 and none of my food is squished.

@SexCpotatoes: +1

@treimel: The annual new lunchbox was my favorite part of going back to school when I was a kid. Star Wars lunchbox FTW!!!