If it's in that kind of bag (with little holes in it), it was definitely freshly baked that day. That kind of bag is designed to keep the bread crispy, but it can only be used on the day it was baked, or the bread will become hard as rock the next day. If a loaf is going to be kept and sold the next day, it has to be rebagged into a solid plastc bag to keep it fresh. "Lovely" is subjective. It's a grocery store baguette.
Ok, in all fairness it may very well be freashly baked, but from a factory. This bagette is made industrially. It's very clear from it's appearance (even ignoring the plastic bag). This bagette does not taste good and in only few hours time it will be dry as hell.
As a proud snail slurper, I don't trust no bagette coming in a plastic bag!
Bread doesn't last long enough in this kind of bag for it to have been baked in a factory and shipped to the store. It's baked fresh in the store that day. It'a baked from a "bread base" (think cake mix, but for bread), to which yeast and water are added. It's mixed, proofed, then baked, all on-site in the bakery. Source: me! I worked in a grocery store bakery.
In a regular bakery, the bread is behind the counter, out of reach of the patrons, correct? In a grocery store, it's all on the shelf, where anyone can touch it. This is much more sanitary. I wouldn't buy any that weren't wrapped up.
No, most grocery stores in Europe have bread in a specific bread container that had a lid on it. You open the lid, take out a baguette and close the lid falls down again. They compartments inside the container get regularly refilled from the back where they are baked. I've seen this setup even in cheapo-chains like Aldi and Lidl.
That's great, but what do you put the bread into? A plastic bag, or do people just carry them around bare? What happens if someone drops it and decides they want another, or just changes their mind about buying one? In North America, they'll probably just put it back in the bin. Now the next person gets floor bread or, at least, something that someone else has been carrying around until they changed their mind.
All bigger chains I have visited seem to have paper like bags for bread stuff. Plastic bags also exist, but those are usually in other grocery sections.
In theory you could pack it in your own container if you wish, do not think anyone would have issues with that, but I have never seen anyone doing that.
Paper bags have to be left open to let the moisture vent and allow the bread to crisp. That doesn't work on the grocery store floor. We tried it. Our first bags were paper.
??? The rest of the world uses paper bags for almost everything, you can't convince me that in usa you have to use non decomposable dead dinosaur bags because you have to throw the bread on floors??