Story by Peter Boer, St. Albert Gazette
For a protest that was nearly shut down moments after it started, a group of Bellerose Composite High School students who set up an information table outside Sobeys Thursday night hailed their demonstration as a wild success.
Grade 12 student Jesse Orge and a group of volunteers set up an information booth outside the St. Albert grocery store to raise awareness of the need to protect Canada’s boreal forest.
The protest was one of 199 such demonstrations across North America, loosely organized by Greenpeace, to ask consumers to stop buying Kleenex-brand tissues. Greenpeace alleges Kimberly-Clark, which makes Kleenex, clear-cuts trees in the boreal forest to make their product.
“It’s pretty ridiculous because they insist on using the virgin fibres of the trees to create that feel of Kleenex everybody knows,” said Orge. “People buy Kleenex because it’s the softest, but what they don’t know is they’re getting that soft tissue from the virgin fibres of ancient forests.”
One of the first people to stop by the booth, however, was Sobeys’ owner. Wayne Armitstead initially asked the group to leave because they had not cleared their demonstration with him. After discussing the issue with Orge, however, Armitstead allowed the students to stay “as long as you don’t drive my customers away from the door.” Armitstead later declined to comment on the demonstration.
Orge said his group only chose Sobeys because it was close to their school. “It could be any grocery store in St. Albert because they all sell Kleenex,” Orge admitted.
In total, the group collected 218 signatures on a petition calling on Kimberly-Clark to halt their clear-cutting practices. Orge and his co-volunteers had also set up a booth at their school over the lunch hour, collecting another 200 names. “We got way more names that we expected, that’s for sure,” said Orge, who said his group also ran out information pamphlets. “We handed out a lot of leaflets, we ran out of petition sheets. There was a lot of interest from people stopping to ask questions.”
Pearl Gillet, who stopped at the booth on her way into Sobeys to pick up some groceries, said she would refrain from buying Kleenex-brand tissues from now on. “I’m pretty proud of the St. Albert kids doing this, taking the time to do this,” said Gillet. “It’s very much necessary.”
One of Orge’s fellow demonstrators, Rob Neys, said it was shoppers like Gillet the group was trying to reach. “We just want to raise awareness of Kimberly Clark using the boreal forest and if some people will stop buying Kleenex, we have accomplished a great deal,” said Neys.
