Customer : Recycling

Less Cups, More Savings

sbx_slon — Wed, 16 Jan 2013 00:36:00 GMT

A top suggestion on My Starbucks Idea has been to focus on offering recycling in stores. We've made some strides here, but also have found alternate ways to reduce cup waste and encourage more people to bring in their own reusable cups. This month, we were happy to announce a great new way to do just that.

We introduced a new, reusable Starbucks cup! We first tested this cup in stores in the Pacific Northwest, and it has been a hit. We’ve sold lots of cups and we’re giving out more personal cup discounts – about 26% more compared to last year. We certainly hope this cup has a similar effect in the rest of the United States and Canada!

While we’ve sold reusable mugs and tumblers for years, what makes this new cup exciting is that it’s yours for only $1. It’s a high-quality, low-cost option to enjoy your favorite Starbucks beverage. This cup is less expensive than other tumblers because it’s made with a lighter material and less of it. Though you’ll need to use a sleeve for the cup when you’re holding a hot drink, it’s a low-cost, high-impact way to help make a difference.

And since you receive a 10-cent discount every time you use it in our stores, this cup pays for itself in just 10 uses. And you’ve saved 10 paper cups! If you use it daily for a month you’ll help avoid using more than a pound of paper or 3.5 pounds of wood. At the end of its life, if polypropylene (#5) plastic recycling is available in your region, you can recycle this cup and truly minimize your impact on the planet.

Starbucks is committed to reducing our cup waste. We have a goal to serve 5% of the beverages we make in our company-owned stores in personal tumblers by 2015. By offering this option and providing our 10-cent discount, we hope to inspire you to bring your own cup.

Inspired by your ideas:

Recycling
posted by deetfind

Reclamation Drive-Thru, Repeated.

sbx_sally — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 16:59:00 GMT

Do you remember the Reclamation Drive-Thru? It was our first store built from shipping containers, conceived by senior designer Anthony Perez. Well, he’s done it again, this time in Denver.

Like its predecessor, this store has been carefully designed with LEED certification in mind. Reclaimed Wyoming snow fencing flanks the building’s exterior and blends in with the native landscaping to create a site that feels as if it’s been there all along.

My favorite feature is the art panel on top of the store. It’s designed to let daylight illuminate the store. This “lantern effect” means minimal exterior lighting is required. The store itself was manufactured in just 8 weeks; construction for the opening was completed in a single week. (Check the video to see the build-out. It’s amazing!)

Your ideas, like building environmentally conscience stores, become our inspiration, so please continue sharing your thoughts with us.

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Save Money, Cups and the Planet

sbx_slon — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 16:24:00 GMT

For as long as MyStarbucksIdea has been around, you have suggested we find ways to reduce cup waste and encourage more people to bring in their own reusable cups. Starting today in the Pacific Northwest, I am happy to announce we have another way of doing just that.

Introducing the new, reusable (and recyclable) Starbucks® cup for hot beverages.

While we’ve sold reusable mugs and tumblers for years, what makes this new reusable cup exciting is that it’s yours for only $1. It’s a quality, low-cost option to enjoy your favorite Starbucks® beverage. And since you receive a 10 cent discount each time you use it in stores, it pays for itself in just ten uses - and then factor in the fact you have saved ten paper cups. If you use it for a month, you will help avoid using more than a pound of paper, or 3.5 lbs of wood. Plus, at the end of its life, if polypropylene (#5) plastic recycling is available in your region, you can recycle this cup and truly minimize your impact on the planet!

Starbucks is committed to reducing our cup waste. We have both recycling goals and a goal to serve 5% of the beverages made in our company-owned stores in personal tumblers by 2015. By offering this low cost, reusable cup option and continuing to provide our 10 cent discount, we are hoping to inspire many of you to bring your own cup.

Think of it as bringing in your reusable bag when you shop. Yes, it might be a slight change of behavior at first, but eventually it becomes the norm. And in case you don’t live in the Pacific Northwest, stay tuned – this simple, fantastic cup will be coming to a Starbucks near you soon.

New Reusable Fall Tote

sbx_nsav — Tue, 25 Sep 2012 20:01:00 GMT

Kick off the fall season with a fresh new look and a fresh new tote bag. You’ve asked us for more reusable bags, so we created the perfectly sized reusable tote for your lunch and snacks on the go.

It’s designed specifically to fit your favorite Starbucks Bistro Box, and features the Starbucks siren on the snap and recycled leather patch to add a hint of style to your day. Plus, a convenient pocket on the side allows you to store accessories, including a wallet, cell phone or water bottle.

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Starbucks Tote Bags!
posted by BrightMoments

New EarthSleeve™ Saves Resources

sbx_slon — Mon, 06 Aug 2012 17:02:00 GMT

Picking up a hot beverage but forgot your travel tumbler? Take a close look at the sleeve on your cup. It looks and performs the same as our previous cup sleeve, but there’s been a big improvement. It has been modified to use 34% less paper and increased the recycled content from 60% to 85% post-consumer fiber – and it’s still compostable and recyclable!

With nearly three billion* hot cup sleeves produced in the United States in 2011 and Starbucks representing nearly half of the marketplace, this innovation will allow us to save almost 100,000 trees, based on our 2011 volume. This new design also saves in shipping – we can fit 15% more sleeves on a truck, reducing the overall environmental impact of the transportation of the sleeves.

The EarthSleeve™ is currently being introduced into select Starbucks locations across the United States and Canada, and we are looking into expanding it globally.

The best thing to do is bring your own tumbler, but when you can’t, be glad we are working with our suppliers to continue to help us reduce the impact of our packaging. And of course, when possible, recycle or compost that sleeve when you are done!

Note: *Data sourced from the 2012 Foodservice Disposable Packaging Assessment, and the Environmental impact estimates were made using the Environmental Paper Network Paper Calculator. For more information visit www.papercalculator.org. All raw material and post-consumer claims on the material makeup of Earthsleeve™ have been validated by the paper suppliers, and their compostability, repulpability and potential environmental benefits have been researched and validated by Cedar Grove, Western Michigan University, and Environmental Paper Network Paper Calculator.

Recycling is Coming to a Starbucks Store Near You

Jim Hanna — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 16:00:00 GMT

Requesting recycling in our stores has been one of the all-time top ideas from both our customers and our partners (employees) since My Starbucks Idea launched in March of 2008. Offering front-of-store recycling in 100% of our company-owned stores has also been a public goal of ours since 2008. While our baristas have been recycling packaging and other materials behind the counter in the majority of our company-owned stores, recycling bins for our customers to use have been noticeably scarce.

We have worked over the years to identify the infrastructure and operational procedures needed to implement recycling in the front of our stores, and are now excited to announce that customer recycling in our stores has officially launched! Between now and our target date of 2015, you will start to see recycling containers show up in stores in your neighborhood. Service should be similar to what you see at home in your curbside recycling (if you have it!), with one bin for recyclables, one for composting and one for trash.

A related journey is the evolution of our paper and plastic cups. We’re working hard to make sure our cups will be universally recyclable when we introduce recycling bins in our stores. Right now, some communities still don’t accept these cups for recycling. In those cities, we are working directly with recyclers, paper mills and local government officials to build a recycling market for our cups. Our aim is for you to be able to recycle your cup not just in our stores, but wherever you choose to dispose of them, because regardless of the materials they’re made out of, our cups will only be truly recyclable when you’re able to recycle them wherever you live, work and play.

For these efforts to be truly successful, we need your help. If the recycling bin gets full of garbage, unfortunately, it all becomes garbage, so take an extra second to make sure what you’re throwing away or recycling at your local Starbucks is going into the proper bin.

See our 2011 Global Responsibility Report and the updated information on Starbucks.com to learn more about our recycling programs. And thank you, in advance, for recycling.

Inspired by your ideas:

Recycling
posted by deetfind

Recycling Efforts at Work for New Store

sbx_bean — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 20:35:00 GMT

We recognize that recycling cups in Starbucks stores is important to the MSI community and the team is working hard on this idea. The store design team is also doing their part to help with recycling. Check out this recent project of one of our designers. The Reclamation Drive-Thru is just one step toward our goal of universally building all new company-owned stores to be LEED-certified. This store was inspired by a desire to help keep items used throughout our supply chain, like old shipping containers, out of the waste stream. The result: a 450 square foot drive-thru and walk-up store made from four end-of-life-cycle shipping containers.

Not only is this store built sustainably, but it is beautiful too. To learn more read Anthony's blog post.

Have you visited this store? Let us know your thoughts on this new sustainable store design.