Last November, Ireland’s Coffeeangel launched their #YourCupOurFuture initiative committing to donate 20¢ to Friends of the Earth for every KeepCup or reusable cup used by their customers. In May, the popular independent coffee company published results from their initiative and announced a savings of over 7,500 single-use paper cups kept out of incineration and landfill in just six months.

Caroline Sleiman, Director at Coffeeangel, commented:

“Before we launched our #YourCupOurFuture initiative last November, a combined total of about 180 customers per week were regularly using reusable cups across our shops. Since then, use of reusable cups has nearly tripled to over 500 cups per week. And that number continues to climb!
We are delighted with how our customers have embraced this change and how, together, we are able to make a small but increasing positive impact on the waste issue that is facing us all.”

In May, Coffeeangel – with the support of their customers – presented their first €1,500 donation to Friends of the Earth from the initiative. It will go towards their recent widely reported “Sick of Plastic” campaign to reduce plastic waste and pollution.

Friends of the Earth’s Head of Communications, Dr. Cara Augustenborg, welcomed the results of Coffeeangel’s initiative, explaining:

“We’re amazed at the rapid success of Coffeeangel’s #Your Cup Our Future initiative, proving there is strong interest among their customers in reducing the environmental impact of their coffee break. Of course, we’re incredibly grateful to Coffeeangel’s customers for their support in allowing us to continue to campaign on environmental issues including plastic pollution and climate change, but even more broadly, we hope Coffeeangel’s results provide evidence for other establishments to adopt similar initiatives to tackle unnecessary waste and pollution.”

Friends of the Earth launched the Sick of Plastic campaign in 2018, in partnership with VOICE Ireland, calling for four things to be done to tackle plastic pollution in Ireland. It includes

– a deposit and return scheme for plastic bottles,

– a measure to reduce single-use plastic packaging

– a ban on plastic microbeads

– and supermarkets to take steps to reduce their packaging.

The NGO recently organised a nationwide “Shop and Drop” day of action at supermarkets. The action was to encourage shoppers to leave their unwanted plastic packaging behind in an effort to encourage retailers to do more to address the waste crisis.