Bring Your Own Cup

Coffee drinkers need to take environmental responsibilities into their own hands.

Throughout my blog we've covered many types of coffee necessities. But the most important of them all is the cup you choose to drink from. We all know the iconic single use Starbucks cups with their green logos and checked boxes containing your perfect order.

Well forget about them!

It is 2019 people. The world is dying. And your daily use of a non-reusable cup is not even remotely okay. Yeah it probably looked cute on your 24 hour snapchat story that everyone clicked past because they didn't care it was your fifth ice coffee that day. Congrats. You've just used FIVE straws, FIVE cups, and FIVE lids that you are throwing away to be ingested by one of those guys up there in that picture.

The time for ignorance is gone. We as coffee drinkers either make a change or partake in the destruction of our ecosystems. Now that I've hopefully made you feel personally reasonable for taking the life a beautiful sea turtle, I'm going to explain to you what you can do to make sure that sea turtle gets to spend more time on this planet.

Reusable Straws

This is definitely the fad from 2018. Everybody started getting rid of plastic straws and replacing them with their reusable ones. This really was the first step in eliminating plastic waste. Starbucks even took the initiative to roll out a lid that doesn't require a straw (Nitro Lid). There are tons of great places to buy them online and in stores. Online you can buy them on Amazon at reasonable prices or from celebrities like Jeffree Star. If your having trouble finding some just say "I need a reusable straw" multiple times into your phone and Instagram will send you ads to get you to the right place. Buy a straw and bring it to your next iced latte brunch. If you forget your straw make sure to request a nitro lid.

Reusable Cups

These could quite possibly be the best chance we have at saving our planet. And yes, I'm simply talking about a cup. I have no doubt you all know what I'm talking about. My only question to you is why have you not been bringing yours with you on your daily coffee run? Starbucks sells reusable hot cups for $2.00 and reusable cold cups for $3.00. And on top of that, you receive a 10 cent discount when you put a drink in them. I have customers that come into Starbucks TWICE a day and order their black coffee.

Now if we do the math:

- 2 lids & 2 sleeves & 2 cups a day

- 14 lids & 14 sleeves & 14 cups a week

- 56 lids & 56 sleeves & 56 cups a MONTH

- 672 LIDS & 672 SLEEVES & 672 CUPS A YEAR

STOP DOING THIS PLEASE. If you had a reusable cup you would have saved $67.20 over the course of a year. I can think of a ton of things that I could do with that kind of cash. Like perhaps purchasing a sweet cup to make the sorority girl in line next to you jealous.

One of the coolest things you can do to impress your barista is walk in with a one of a kind coffee mug, tumbler or cup. Starbucks sells some of the most aesthetically pleasing cups. They are not terribly expensive (range from $15 to $50), but will last you a life time if properly taken care of.

My other favorite place to purchase mugs or cups is Marshalls and TJ Max. These ones range from $3 to $20. There is absolutely no excuse as to why you wouldn't bring your own cup to your local coffee shop.

Reusable Water Bottles

Ordering a complicated syrupy drink and not wanting to put it in your nice reusable cup because it would be hard to clean is somewhat understandable. But ordering a water and not bringing your own water bottle to put it in? Thats just one big cup of I-don't-care-about-my-planet. Its absolutely disrespectful to ask the earth to give you clean water, just for you to drink natures sweet nectar out of a cup your going to throw back in her face ten minutes later. As a barista I'm sick of giving out cups of water/ice. I have no problem filling up a water bottle or a cooler with ice for your entire office. But handing out 5 cups of ice to the office intern who's picking up drinks for everyone EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. Again, the utter arrogance is not something I can sit back and watch. Water bottles can be purchased LITERALLY ANYWHERE. I would hyperlink some locations but that would be an insult to your intelligence. I know you know where to buy one. I know you know how to carry one. So I expect you to bring it when I take your order.

I'm done ranting. All of the information that I've written here is not news to any one reading this. It is a complete lack of awareness that the coffee community lacks. I see firsthand everyday how many cups I'm handing out and think to myself how easy it would be to reduce that number. Simply make the effort to remember your cup. I want all of my readers to start thinking about the plastic footprint they are leaving on our planet and reduce is by one cup a week until you completely stop using single use cups.

Thanks for coming to my TED Talk

Sincerely Siren

P.S. "Your as easy as a Starbucks iced chai latte" For my baristas reading this, my fellow barista Jennifer informed me of this Starbucks pick up line that we found extremely funny, but only if you work as a barista. Your welcome.