Over the next year, Starbucks plans to test different cups
that are both recyclable and compostable in five cities worldwide. The chain
will deploy cup technologies that come from the recent NextGen Cup Challenge
winners.
This week Starbucks said that customers in New York, San Francisco, Seattle, Vancouver, and London will get to try out the new cups. Early last year, Starbucks helped start the NextGen Cup Challenge with Closed Loop Partners. This industry consortium aiming to identify and commercialize fully recyclable and compostable cups has since gained support from McDonald’s, Coca-Cola, Yum Brands, Wendy’s, Nestlé, and the WWF.
In late February, Closed Loop Partners announced 12 winners of the open-sourced global innovation challenge to redesign fiber to-go cups. Expert judges chose them from nearly 500 international submissions in three categories: innovative cup liners, new materials, and reusable cup service models.
Next, as many as six winners will go into the NextGen
Circular Business Accelerator, which provides testing and piloting
opportunities to help the solutions reach shelves.
In addition to the cup testing planned for five locations globally, Starbucks is rolling out new lightweight, recyclable strawless lids in the United States and Canada. Stores in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Washington, D.C., Indianapolis, and Toronto will be the first to get the lids, which have 9% less plastic than the current lid and straw combined. All stores in the US and Canada should have the lids by early next year.
The move is part of the company’s efforts to phase plastic straws out of their more than 30,000 stores globally by 2020.
“We want to play a leading role in helping around the sustainability of the planet. And that means serving our coffee in sustainable packaging,” Starbucks CEO Kevin Johnson told CNN Business. “We think there’s a better solution.”
