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Where the hell are you from "as a European"? In Germany you can get a take-out almost anywhere they sell coffee. Vending machines are ubiquitous. It's not just
by exodus_de 7y ago
Where the hell are you from "as a European"? In Germany you can get a take-out almost anywhere they sell coffee. Vending machines are ubiquitous. It's not just for "Americans".
Having a coffee takes more than three minutes, especially if it's still hot. People don't necessarily have that kind of time in the morning. Or maybe they prefer to drink their coffee at a different place than where they purchased it.
- carlob 7y agoI'm in Italy, but I've seen it throughout Southwestern Europe. If you are in Rome or in Paris, to-go coffee is advertised exclusively in English and cannot be found outside of tourist hubs. FWIW vending machines are popular here too, but they use small plastic cups with no lid.
- pjmlp 7y agoFrom my two years living in the Alps region, they are surely easy to find, written in French. And if you go to Southeastern Europe, it is everywhere, mostly the iced coffee variant.
- samuell 7y agoHappy to hear that Italy maintains some proper coffee-drinking culture :)
- synthmeat 7y agoEffectively not being able to sit and sip my coffee with cigarettes in peace for few hours was biggest cultural shock when I was in Bari, and I'm just over the pond. Still fun. :) Hi from Croatia.
- SJetKaran 7y agoYes, similar situation in Netherlands
- egeozcan 7y agoIt's usually that people want to drink during their commute. I'm also living in Germany and I don't remember being given a plastic cup - they are always made out of paper, except their lids. I think they should just ban the lids. I also saw a lot of discounted price offers for people bringing their own containers in take-away coffee shops
- DanBC 7y agoThe lids are easily recyclable. The paper cups have a plastic lining. They can be recycled, but not easily. Most recycling centres can't take them. As an end user it's really hard for me to know what to do: is this single use hard to recycle plastic environmentally worse than ceramic mugs being washed or plastic reusable cups being reused maybe dozens of times if we're lucky. Personally, I'd go for single use plastic / paper cups and high temperature incineration, but I have no idea if that's the right thing to do.
- truckerbill 7y agoWashing a ceramic mug is clearly the better choice environmentally-or bring your own reusable to-go cup.
- gridlockd 7y ago> a ceramic mug Not so fast! A ceramic mug takes a huge amount of energy to produce, so unless you reuse it many times, it won't break even: https://terngoods.com/blogs/learn/cups-single-use-disposable-vs-reusable-an-honest-comparison https://terngoods.com/blogs/learn/cups-single-use-disposable... Keep in mind that even a ceramic mug eventually becomes trash - with a far higher mass than paper/plastic cups. Then of course there's the environmental impact of washing the cup, but I don't have any data on that.
- DanBC 7y agoYou say clearly, but the full lifetime calculation is difficult. I have no idea how the clay is obtained, transported to the mug factory, how it's turned into mugs, how the mugs are transported to shops and then to cafés and homes. I don't know how to include the detergent used to wash them, or the dishwasher. I guess we need to include the hot water, but how much of the plumbing do we include? I also don't know any of this for the paper/plastic cups.
- reubeniv 7y agoseconded, it's pretty common in the UK to grab a take-out coffee too. When I worked in a bigger city it was sometimes a bit of a treat occasionally to grab one on the way to the office.