5 ms·

I wonder why they don't come up with a cheap, washable cup that the customers 'borrow' for the duration of drinking coffee. You buy a coffee for 3 bucks, you ge

• robryan 16y ago
  Or make it compulsory to bring your own cup, which they also sell in store if you don't yet have a suitable one. This would be great but given the competitive nature of the industry would only work in certain locations where people are more environmentally conscious.
  • jasonkester 16y ago
    Ever been to a grocery store that forced you to buy bags to take your stuff home? More specifically, ever been back to that store? It just doesn't work (for us Americans at least).
    • tbrownaw 16y ago
      Yes. They also had the carts locked up so you needed to deposit a quarter (which you got back by locking your cart up again), didn't take credit cards (only debit/cash), and didn't have name-brand anything. It worked fine, except that their bread would often start to grow mold by the time we were maybe two-thirds through a loaf (which doesn't seem to happen with bread from other stores). We'd probably still go there for other things, except that we always need bread and going to two separate stores is annoying.
    • robryan 16y ago
      In general, I don't think it would work in many places in Australia either. People have grown to comfortable with consuming and are unable to see real consequences on any time frame that matters to them. The market will eventually sort this out, but not before it is far to later. Recently I have encouraged to know that many people pay the green electricity surcharge, which means you are subsidizing more green sources of power being integrated into the grid, I'd assumed that they would have a really low uptake on that kind of thing.
    • fr0sty 16y ago
      It's called Aldi and they have over 1,000 stores in the US. They have build a half cozen in my area in the past few years so I figure they cannot be doing that poorly... As someone else mentioned: They also make you pay a $.25 deposit to use a shopping cart, don't take credit cards, and don't offer name-brand anything.
    • trin_ 16y ago
      works in EVERY grocery store in germany.
  • wildmXranat 16y ago
    To go even further, this should be a mandated policy city by city. And it should be a blanket policy that applies to any hot beverage being sold. Just like a shopping bag. 1. All shops serving hot beverages require a mug. The mug may be purchased at any shop covered by the policy, or otherwise bring your own. Warning about 'Caution, Hot Beverage inside!' become moot. Your cup , your problem. 2. Purchased mug is sold at small profit and first fill-up is free or whatever incentive to purchase the liquid additionally with the mug. 3. Purchases that use a refillable mug, get a 5% discount during phase-in. 4. Shops do not offer to charge extra for the disposable cups. If available, this lazy option would give a choice that leaves them justified in being lazy, and creates a sort of contract that they still contribute to the greater good. 5. Add a creative incentive that allows purchasers to add value to this activity. Marketers can add to this. 6. Make all these mugs as easy to wash and as durable as possible. Non-toxic, non-breakable, easy to wash. No problem. 7. People love to drink coffee/tea in their cars. There's an another possible angle to create a cross-incentive Well there's a few things I thought about.
• danteembermage 16y ago
  I wonder if health liability doesn't drive this, at least partially. Also, do Starbucks have dish washing facilities currently? That adds a lot of space to the footprint of their small stores (It looks to me as though Starbucks can currently just about be run out of a hallway). I'm not trying to be critical of the approach, I think it's great, it just seems like there might be some nontrivial costs to implementing it.
  • ugh 16y ago
    You can get your coffee in a ceramic mug (I have only ever been in European Starbucks but it would seem weird if that’s not a worldwide thing.) so they must have some sort of dish washing capability.
    • acgourley 16y ago
      Not in the US
• bendtheblock 16y ago
  Similar idea: http://www.keepcup.com.au/ http://www.keepcup.com.au/
• city41 16y ago
  About a year or so ago, Microsoft's campuses made a huge switch from all plastic cups/silverware to compostable materials. Silverware/cups literally made out of corn and potatoes and such. A common question was "why doesn't MS just give each employee a ceramic mug?" The response was that MS found it's actually more environmentally damaging to wash them than it is to compost a crap load of cups. I found that response interesting. I'm not claiming that response was true (it might have just been compostable cups were cheaper for MS). But I am often surprised to find intuition and the environment don't always go hand in hand.
  • oiuytgfrtgyhuji 16y ago
    That's true for hand washed mugs. Running your coffee cup under the hot tap in the kitchen uses vastly more energy than making a paper one or cleaning batches of cups in an industrial dishwasher. Best alternative is my coffee cup that I have black coffee (no milk or sugar) and I refill but never wash. Gradually the layer of coffee tar on the inside exchanges with the fresh coffee. It's also pretty hygienic, nobody else ever borrows my mug, and nothing can live on the layer of caffeine sludge.
    • jmm 16y ago
      Yes, our obsession with cleanliness/newness is one of the major culprits in our piles of waste. And to think we once lived amongst each other with communal drinking cups at the water fountain...
• windsurfer 16y ago
  Starbucks and Tim Hortons already do this in Canada, but without the need for a deposit. In fact, I believe they give you larger portions if you say you wanted your coffee "for here".
• itistoday 16y ago
  This is the solution. Disposable shit is bad, period. They could also reward customers with $0.50 off (or whatever) their purchase for bringing in their own cup. They can retrofit their machines to charge only for the amount of liquid dispensed into the cup (instead of having only 3 sizes), and throw marketing dollars at the whole thing.