At GoGreenMug we are committed to reducing the waste by encouraging the use of reusable travel mugs. When visiting a coffee shop bring your travel mug with you and ask the barrista to fill your mug instead of the paper or styrofoam cups offered. In this way we can reduce the contribution of coffee cups to our already large waste and pollution problem. Visit http://www.gogreenmug.com/ to get your own personalized travel mug. Use coupon code: ff2510ggm until January 1, 2009 to get a 20% discount.
In the latest "Making Waves" magazine (a Surfrider Foundation newsletter), I read about the Junk Raft, and was reminded of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. This relatively stationary area of the Pacific Ocean, which is kept in place by strong ocean currents called the North pacific Gyre, contains an estimated 100 million tons of waste material collected mostly from land based sources, such as polystyrene drinking cups and plastic lids.
As the plastic flotsam degrades in the sun, into smaller and smaller pieces, it becomes small enough to enter the food chain of the bird and aquatic species in this region. In samples taken from the gyre in 2001, the mass of plastic exceeded that of zooplankton (the dominant animal life in the area) by a factor of seven. Many of these plastic pieces end up in the stomachs of marine birds and animals, sometimes causing infection to these animals.
There is an obvious need to reduce this waste but what are our local coffee shops doing to help encourage us to bring in reusable mugs? Many of them give a discount. We have found this discount to vary depending on where you go for your daily cup. We have therefore decided to add a feature to this blog to let you know what discounts are available for customers with reusable mugs at specific coffee shops and what we think of this discount.
This week we visited a few coffee shops: The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf in Irvine, CA @ Main and Harvard offered us a 10 cent discount (did not seem to matter what drink it was.) The Starbucks in the Target center in the Westminister Mall, Westminister, CA also offered a 10 cents discount for regular coffee, but seemed to suggest a discretionary discount policy depending on your drink order. Mag's Donuts and Bakery on the corner of Culver and Michelson in Irvine, CA offered us a 5 cent discount, although admittedly their coffee is a lot cheaper than Starbucks or Coffee Bean.
We believe that a 10 cent discount (particularly on a more expensive drink) is not really going to encourage customers to remember to bring in their own mug each day. If these coffee shops are really interested in helping to reduce the waste and not simply in saving money on coffee cups, we believe the discounts need to be more enticing.
Let us know what you think - take your reusable travel mug into your coffee shop, order your favorite drink and ask the barrista what discount they will give you for bringing in your own mug. Enjoy your drink , get a photo or two of yourself and your mug inside or outside the coffee shop and then send us your comments and a photo (either comment to this blog or email support@gogreenmug.com). We will then post a list of coffee shops and the discounts they offer as well as the best photograph each week.
We can all help reduce the waste and hopefully reduce the impact on the Great Pacific Garbage Patch!
Until next time- Reduce the Waste!
In the latest "Making Waves" magazine (a Surfrider Foundation newsletter), I read about the Junk Raft, and was reminded of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. This relatively stationary area of the Pacific Ocean, which is kept in place by strong ocean currents called the North pacific Gyre, contains an estimated 100 million tons of waste material collected mostly from land based sources, such as polystyrene drinking cups and plastic lids.
As the plastic flotsam degrades in the sun, into smaller and smaller pieces, it becomes small enough to enter the food chain of the bird and aquatic species in this region. In samples taken from the gyre in 2001, the mass of plastic exceeded that of zooplankton (the dominant animal life in the area) by a factor of seven. Many of these plastic pieces end up in the stomachs of marine birds and animals, sometimes causing infection to these animals.
There is an obvious need to reduce this waste but what are our local coffee shops doing to help encourage us to bring in reusable mugs? Many of them give a discount. We have found this discount to vary depending on where you go for your daily cup. We have therefore decided to add a feature to this blog to let you know what discounts are available for customers with reusable mugs at specific coffee shops and what we think of this discount.
This week we visited a few coffee shops: The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf in Irvine, CA @ Main and Harvard offered us a 10 cent discount (did not seem to matter what drink it was.) The Starbucks in the Target center in the Westminister Mall, Westminister, CA also offered a 10 cents discount for regular coffee, but seemed to suggest a discretionary discount policy depending on your drink order. Mag's Donuts and Bakery on the corner of Culver and Michelson in Irvine, CA offered us a 5 cent discount, although admittedly their coffee is a lot cheaper than Starbucks or Coffee Bean.
We believe that a 10 cent discount (particularly on a more expensive drink) is not really going to encourage customers to remember to bring in their own mug each day. If these coffee shops are really interested in helping to reduce the waste and not simply in saving money on coffee cups, we believe the discounts need to be more enticing.
Let us know what you think - take your reusable travel mug into your coffee shop, order your favorite drink and ask the barrista what discount they will give you for bringing in your own mug. Enjoy your drink , get a photo or two of yourself and your mug inside or outside the coffee shop and then send us your comments and a photo (either comment to this blog or email support@gogreenmug.com). We will then post a list of coffee shops and the discounts they offer as well as the best photograph each week.
We can all help reduce the waste and hopefully reduce the impact on the Great Pacific Garbage Patch!
Until next time- Reduce the Waste!
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