Starbucks To Discontinue Plastic Straws
Starbucks has just announced that they’re doing away with plastic straws, and it’s happening soon, in effort to combat ocean pollution.
By nowproducerdave on July 9, 2018
The plastic straws from Starbucks are going away, the company says. Just today, they announced the change that’s coming to all locations by the year 2020.
We're removing plastic straws in our stores globally by 2020—reducing more than 1 billion plastic straws per year from our stores.
— Starbucks Coffee (@Starbucks) July 9, 2018
Straws, along with a lot of other plastic, are found in the ocean all the time. Yes, there are other things found in oceans, including up to 8 million tons of other plastics, but straws are a big problem, according to many. Straws have been a hot topic for a few months now, with a lot of restaurants already cutting back on their use. Some restaurant have them, but only if you ask for one. Other restaurants have done away with them completely. There are also some more eco-friendly paper straws being used. In addition, there is new compostable plastic that’s being used to make straws too.
Starbucks is the biggest company to quit distributing plastic straws so far. That’s going to make a huge impact on the fight against straws. They’ve already designed a new cup topper that has a sort of built-in “sippy cup” mouthpiece on it. It quite literally is a sippy cup for adults, seen above. Starbucks hopes that their move will help cut down on some of the plastic making it into the ocean. Again, straws only make up a tiny portion of the plastic in the oceans. However, banning straws is starting the conversation, and we feel like the newfound attention plastic in the ocean is getting will sort of help cut back on the trash. It’s also going to make people more aware of where trash ends up, and that could have the biggest impact of all. Check out some more info on the Starbucks straws here.
