Queen Mary Café is partnering with 'Reuser' to trial reusable takeaway cups that will replace single-use cups.
We have partnered with the local company ‘Reuser’ to supply washable cups and lids in two sizes for all beverages at the Queen Mary Café next to Department W. Disposable cups will now cost 25p extra to encourage opting for the reusable cups.
The reusable cups and lids are to be placed in special bins around the café and Department W labelled ‘Reuser’. They are then collected and taken off site by cargo bike to be washed in an industrial dishwasher with four cycles to ensure they are clean before they are returned to us. This does rely on all customers placing their Reuser cups and lids in the correct bins so we ask for everyone’s diligence - please make sure you don't accidentally place them in general waste or recycling bins.
While single-use items go straight into waste streams, the Reuser cups are in a closed-loop system. Each Reuser cup is expected to have 1000 uses, having an enormous impact on the savings on single-use cups. As highlighted in Reuser’s story, the UK uses over 3.2 billion disposable coffee cups every year, with approximately 500,000 of them being littered every day. Coffee cups are also not recyclable because they are made from mixed materials and are contaminated by drink residue (though they can be recycled if collected separately in a specialised recycling bin like the one in Ground Café). We aim to reduce our use of single-use cups to almost zero to minimise our contribution to this problem.
This will be launched on Tuesday 16th January.
In the future, we plan on adding reusable containers for the food in the café and expand to the food and drink outlets on across the campuses, so keep an eye out for these announcements!