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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

plastic waste

Yelp Has a New Initiative to Help Reduce Plastic Waste in Restaurants

Yelp gave a nod to Earth Day this morning by launching a new initiative that rates restaurants’ eco-friendliness factor.

With Yelp’s Green Practices initiative, Yelp reviewers can answer questions around a restaurant’s takeout packaging — whether the business offers compostable containers, uses plastic bags, or has discounts for things like bringing your own reusable beverage mug. The interface to do so looks and functions much like any other Yelp rating tool:

According to a blog post by Yelp product manager Jason Purdy, Yelp will use the information from the surveys “to better understand restaurant behaviors across the country and inform how we surface information about restaurant sustainability for consumers.”

Single-use plastics are just the start. Purdy noted in the same blog post that Yelp is working with a number of different partners to gather and present information about multiple sustainability issues, including the State of California Air Resource Board, the City of Los Angeles Green Business Program, and Clean Water Action’s ReThink Disposable program.

Purdy’s post also said Yelp will eliminate single-use plastic cups, plates, and utensils from all U.S. offices by the end of 2019.

Reducing packaging waste is a huge topic in the restaurant industry right now, with an ever-growing number of businesses announcing various moves to tackle their reliance on single-use plastic. Starbucks announced last year it would eliminate single-use plastic straws from its 28,000 locations by 2020. McDonald’s is trying to find a more sustainable hot/cold cup. KFC has said it will convert to renewable plastic sources by 2025.

Beyond businesses, the EU vowed it will ban single-use plastics by 2021. Stateside, Seattle became the first major U.S. city to ban single-use plastics, in 2018; California and Washington, D.C. NYC currently has legislation in place to enact a similar ban.

To be honest, there are probably enough initiatives in place at this point to fill a 1,500-word post. The question is whether they’ll have enough of an effect on consumer behavior to change our relationship with single-use plastics in restaurants. To be sure, programs like Yelp’s will get people thinking more about how much waste gets created just by getting a to-go order. Now it’s a matter of using these types of initiatives to get consumers beyond thinking and into action.

EU to Ban Single-Use Plastics by 2021

Yesterday, the European Parliament voted to ban single-use plastics — like straws, plates, coffee stirrers and lids, to-go containers, and cutlery — by 2021 (h/t The Guardian). The ban will go into effect in all EU member states and possibly the U.K., depending on what happens with Brexit.

The European Commission first proposed this ban last year, calling out the 10 single-use plastic items that make up 70 percent of all litter in EU waters and beaches. With this vote, the ban is official.

The legislation also outlines goals that by 2025 plastic bottles should be made of 25 percent recycled content, and that by 2029 90 percent of them should be recycled.

This is part of a global initiative to reduce plastic waste in oceans, which shakes out to about 8 million metric tons per year — all of which will take at least 450 years to biodegrade. Those are some pretty bleak statistics, but there’s some hope when you see countries around the world starting to instill plastic-reducing initiatives. In addition to this EU ban, Kenya has instated the world’s toughest ban on plastic bags, Montreal has axed single-use plastic bags, and Taiwan has plans to get rid of all single-use plastics by 2030.

Europe isn’t the only one trying to cut down on plastic consumption. Here in the U.S., we’ve also made some moves to eliminate single-use plastics, mostly straws. Starbucks announced it will eliminate plastic straws from all 28,000 of its locations by 2020, replacing them with a sort of adult sippy-cup lid. Starbuck’s home city of Seattle became the first major U.S. city to ban single-use plastics (straws, utensils, etc.) last year, followed by California and Washington, D.C. New York City might be next.

I’m not sure how quickly the U.S. will follow in Europe’s footsteps with a wide-reaching plastic ban of its own. We’re too obsessed with convenience and instant gratification. More feasibly, my colleague Jenn recently suggested that if food delivery companies got on board with plastic reduction, maybe replacing plastic cutlery with biodegradable options, that could be a massive help in our to-go-loving culture. Hopefully one or the other will happen before our oceans become even more clogged with plastics.

Alltown Fresh is Revamping the Convenience Store with Kombucha and Avocado Toast

Pull into any gas station to fill up and grab a snack, and chances are your options will be potato chips, sugary sodas, and one of those hot dogs shriveling under a heat lamp.

Unless, that is, you’re near Plymouth, MA. Around there, you can swing by Alltown Fresh, a fancified convenience store which opened in January of this year and offers high-quality coffee, kombucha on tap, house-made healthy food and smoothies, WiFi, and even a small selection of groceries.

Oh yeah, and you can fill up your car, too. Alltown Fresh’s parent company is Global Partners, a fuel company that owns and supplies roughly 1,000 gas stations throughout the Northeastern U.S. But Alltown Fresh doesn’t position itself as a gas station that happens to have pretty good food. “We want to flip that paradigm,” Alltown Fresh’s SVP of Retail Operations Ryan Riggs told me over the phone. They want their store to be a place you seek out for its food and beverage options first, and to fill up on gas second (or not at all).

Yes, there are already gas station convenience stores with QSR’s like Subways or Dairy Queen’s attached, but Alltown Fresh’s offerings — with greens-filled smoothies, Moroccan chickpea bowls, and quinoa porridge — are next-level healthy. But for those who are loyal to their road trip junk food, don’t fear. “You can still get your Snicker’s,” Riggs told me. The unhealthy food just won’t be the only option.

Choice and customization are key to Alltown Fresh’s business plan. Customers order fresh food on a kiosk touchscreen inside the convenience store, and can even customize toppings and sizes. The store also has a limited selection of groceries like dry pasta and tomato sauce, as well as a bulk section where people can stock up on nuts and grains. In future, it would be a smart play to add meal kits to the mix so commuters could stop by and swipe a kit for dinner along with their cold brew or smoothie. Alltown Fresh also has grab-and-go options like bowls and sandwiches ready for quick purchases.

The prices are higher than typical gas station fare, but for what you’re getting, they’re actually pretty good. The Green Smash (avocado, chia and pumpkin seeds on toast) is $6, and a Chili Chicken grain bowl is $13, and a small latté is $2. Considering that a latté from Starbuck’s can set you back about five bucks at this point, that’s a steal.

The company is also prioritizing plastic-free packaging, and uses chiefly recyclable, biodegradable options for the prepared food section. Obviously it’s a lot harder to get rid of plastic when it comes to the brands on Alltown Fresh’s shelves, especially when a lot of them are packaged snacks and bottled beverages, but Riggs said that they were trying to offer as many plastic-free options as possible.

As someone who has been on her fair share of road trips and often ends up subsisting off of diet soda and Cheez-Itz, I think Alltown Fresh has hit on a great concept. The store combines a few trends we’re seeing in consumer dining preferences: personalization, healthy food, and, above all, convenience, in a way I haven’t seen before. The closest comparison I can make is The Goods Mart in L.A., which is also trying to redefine convenience stores as sustainable and healthy — but they’re more bodega than gas station stop.

Riggs told me that they’re hoping to open more Alltown Fresh locations in 2019 and 2020, all of which will be in New England. Now if they could just make it to Seattle so I can fuel up on more than just a bag of sour cream & onion chips on my next road trip, it would be much appreciated.

The Brooklyn Councilman Who Wants to Ban Plastic Straws Is Now Going After Cutlery

There’s a new (plastic) target on the block for Brooklyn Councilman Rafael Espinal, otherwise known as the guy who introduced a ban on plastic straws in NYC last year. Today, Espinal introduced legislation that would lead to the eventual ban of disposable plastics like restaurant takeout cutlery.

The bill wouldn’t actually ban the cutlery itself. Rather, it would require the city to “review items made with single use plastics at least annually and ban those items for which reasonable alternatives are available.” That task would fall to the NYC department of Consumer Affairs, along with the department of Sanitation and the department of Environmental Protection.

From the legislation text:

The commissioner shall on February 1, 2020, and annually thereafter, report to the mayor and the speaker of the city council on single use plastic items considered, the evaluation including economic feasibility and environmental effectiveness, and the determinations.

Only after these areas are evaluated and a suitable replacement found would the ban on the actual plastic item, cutlery or otherwise, go into effect. Which sounds nice and orderly on paper but would in reality take a long time to go into effect — years, in fact.

Still, the proposed legislation continues the conversation around what to do about the amount of single-use plastic that goes into the trash. Investor Rob Kaplan of Circulate Capital, whose work is heavily involved in the environment, put it well last year when he told National Geographic: “There’s no silver bullet to stop plastic pollution. We’re not going to be able to recycle our way out of the problem, and we’re not going to be able to reduce our way out of the problem,” adding that we have to pursue both tracks while continuing to seek other solutions to make any sort of dent.

In the world of single-use plastics, particularly those at restaurants, Espinal’s legislation is aimed at finding those other solutions. How challenging that would be remains a question mark. Nix a plastic straw and your beverages are still drinkable; nix a plastic spoon, and you’ll have to get creative about how to eat that cup of mashed potatoes from the diner.

There’s also the question of what “reasonable alternative” would actually entail. The legislation discusses “economic feasibility” and “environmental feasibility,” but doesn’t point to specific materials that could replace plastic. There are a number of plastic alternatives when it comes to things like cutlery, from wood to vegetable starch and other plant-based materials. But again, there’s the economic factors to consider, and the proposed legislation text only says economic feasibility includes “direct and avoided costs such as whether the material is capable of being collected by the department in the same truck as source separated metal, glass and plastic recyclable material, and shall include consideration of markets for recycled material.”

We saw a number of private companies rally last year by banning plastic straws, or at least kickstarting the process to ban them. If Espinal’s new legislation were to be effective, it would need to happen in tandem with another massive effort on the part of companies like Starbucks, Alaska Airlines, and others to ban single-use items like cutlery, plastic bags, and other eating items. In this to-go-obsessed culture, that could be a huge ask.

So maybe it’s time for the delivery companies themselves to get involved. Ever the skeptic, I have my doubts this would ever happen. But companies like Grubhub, Uber Eats, and DoorDash are wielding a massive influence over U.S. culture at the moment. It would be nice to think they could use that influence (and money) to show the rest of us how to creatively counter the craze for single-use plastics.

The Wally Shop is a Grocery Delivery Service with Zero Packaging Waste

Even if you’re trying to shop sustainably — buying in bulk, choosing local produce, bringing your own bag to the supermarket — chances are, your weekly grocery order isn’t totally waste-free.

But one startup in Brooklyn wants to make zero-waste grocery shopping a reality. The Wally Shop is an online grocery-delivery service where the packaging, delivery, and bags are all waste-free. Seriously.

Here’s how it works: If you’re in an area where The Wally Shop is active (they currently serve a dozen-ish zip codes in Brooklyn), you can shop on their website for goods from local farmers markets and bulk stores (produce, coffee, tea, grains, etc.). After choosing your goods, you then pick a delivery time between 6-8 p.m. If you order before 2 p.m. you can have your order delivered same day.

Once Wally receives an incoming order, the company’s in-house shoppers will hit up local markets and bulk stores to find the items on your grocery list. Back at the company’s warehouse, those goods are repacked into reusable containers. Think glass mason jars and muslin bags. The entire order gets put in a reusable tote bag and delivered to you via bicycle. Each packaging item costs one dollar; customers can return the containers and get their deposit applied to their next order, or they can keep the packaging.

The Wally Shop launched in October of 2018, but CEO Tamara Lim has been developing the concept for two years — ever since she realized the inefficiencies of America’s recycling infrastructure while working in packaging and shipping department at Amazon. There, she learned how tricky recycling infrastructure is in the U.S., where packaging is difficult to recycle, and recycled packaging is more expensive for companies to buy than virgin. According to the EPA, in 2015 only about half of packaging (boxes, plastic coverings, etc.) was recycled. The remaining ended up in landfills, totaling over 29 million tons (21 percent of the total landfill).

The staggering amount of packaging waste isn’t just because people are lazy. It can be tricky to figure out how to properly recycle various packaging components, especially when it comes to ice packs and tiny containers that keep groceries and meal kits chilled en route to your doorstep. Instead of trying to convert to 100 percent curbside recyclable packaging, like meal kit service Purple Carrot did a few months ago, Lim decided to do away with the problem altogether. “I wanted to make it really convenient for people to be sustainable,” she told me over the phone.

Photo: The Wally Shop

The Wally Shop’s timing could not have been better, as it’s situated squarely at the convergence of three major food trends:

1: Consumers want local, sustainable, organic food with a transparent supply chain, and are willing to pay more for it. With The Wally Store, they’ll have to: As with most farmers market produce, Wally’s prices are higher than your average corner grocery. On top of the actual shopping bill, all orders have a 15 percent service fee tacked on, plus the packaging costs and a $3.99 delivery charge. That can add up, so we’ll have to see if consumers are willing to pay a handsome premium for ethical grocery shopping.

2: Convenience is king. Zero-waste grocery stores do actually exist (though not many), but The Wally Shop will be able to serve a wider range of customers by taking advantage of the growing demand for grocery delivery. And while the Wally Shop can’t compete with the 2-hour delivery windows of Amazon/Whole Foods, their zero-waste angle will likely draw in consumers who are willing to wait longer for a more sustainable shopping experience.

3: In the wake of single-use plastic straw bans and pushback against meal kit/delivery packaging, people are waking up to the widespread problem of non-recyclable plastics and packaging. Even big brands are getting onboard: just last week Pepsi, Nestlé, and Unilever teamed up to ditch plastic and sell their products in reusable containers. Branding themselves as “waste-free” is a smart way for Lim and her team to generate a consumer base of ethical shoppers.

As of now, Wally’s team is a pretty small operation: They have four full-time employees and four to five shoppers. Lim told me The Wally Shop has roughly 500 customers signed up right now, and currently has friends & family funding. Next, Lim told me she plans to expand their waste-free grocery delivery service to Manhattan and, eventually, go beyond NYC into San Francisco, Boston, and L.A.

When speaking to Lim, I couldn’t help but think of Farmdrop, the U.K.-based ethical grocery delivery service that sources goods from local farmers and purveyors. The company also has an option where consumers can choose to have the food unpacked at their house (no packaging left behind). I wrote that Farmdrop is a good option for those who want to support local farmers markets but don’t have time to physically shop there, and I think The Wally Shop could serve the same demographic. Lim also mentioned that the service is a good tool for mobility-challenged consumers who still want to shop sustainably.

While I’m cautious that their high prices and service fees will make it hard to attract a larger consumer base and scale up, The Wally Shop’s sustainable business model could generate enough buzz to carve out a grocery delivery niche that’s actually waste-free — at least in wealthy urban areas.

KFC Will Convert to Renewable Plastic Sources By 2025

KFC announced today it plans to eliminate non-reusable, plastic-based packaging from its supply chain by 2025, Nations Restaurant News reports.

To meet that pledge, the chain will work with suppliers worldwide to identify alternative plastic sources for items like lids, cutlery, straws, and plastic bags. Additionally, the chain said via press release it will conduct audits of its franchises current systems to find areas for reducing plastic waste. Though the chain hasn’t said what could potentially replace plastic, KFC franchisees will be able to create their own sustainable packing agenda, so materials could vary based on markets.

“With environmental sustainability as a core aspect of how we do business, this commitment represents a public acknowledgment of the obligation we have to address these serious issues.” KFC CEO, Tony Lowings, said in the press release.

Some KFC stores have already taken large steps in the direction of cutting down on plastics. In 2018, the company stopped offering lids and straws for drinks at 84 of its Singapore locations — though that only applies to customers eating at the restaurant. Locations in France and Romania, meanwhile, are looking to replace plastic straws with paper ones.

KFC’s pledge follows similar moves by the likes of McDonald’s and Starbucks to reduce single-use plastics. In January of 2018, McDonald’s announced its goal of having 100 percent of its restaurants use fully recyclable packaging by 2025. Also in 2018, Starbucks launched its open-source “Greener Stores” initiative, of which reducing waste is one part. Prior to that, the coffee giant had announced it would eliminate single-use plastic straws from more than 28,000 locations by 2020.

Like those chains, KFC’s reach is wide, as the company operates 22,000 restaurants in 135 countries across the globe. It’s also involved in the the NextGenCup Consortium, a partnership amongst food-service leaders to address the 250 billion cups produced annually that wind up, for the most part, in landfills. Working with partners like McDonald’s, Starbucks, The Coca-Cola Company, and KFC’s parent company, Yum Brands, the consortium fosters innovation towards finding a more sustainable cup design for quick-service restaurants.

Finding the perfect cup and then getting it into stores will be something of an uphill battle, given the dizzying inconsistencies over what can be recycled where, not just in the U.S. but worldwide. You also have to get consumers to actually recycle, which sounds like a no-brainer but will be a challenge, given that, in the U.S., 91 percent of plastic isn’t recycled.

Still, it’s nice to see mega brands signing on to make steps towards change. I expect we’ll hear more rumblings around this in the coming months, and 2020 so far looks to be the year major change starts happening when it comes to finding more sustainable ways to do quick-service food.

Pepsi and Nestlé to Trial Reusable Containers in Effort to Ditch Plastic

This summer, a group of 25 big name brands including Pepsi, Nestlé and Procter & Gamble will test out a new program that sells products in reusable containers in an effort to combat rampant plastic waste, reports The Wall Street Journal.

The new program, dubbed Loop, will be run by recycling company, TerraCycle, and will kick off in May, starting with 5,000 shoppers in New York and Paris. From there it will branch out to more locations like London, Toronto and Tokyo over the next year.

Some examples of the new packaging include Pepsi selling Tropicana orange juice in glass bottles, and Häagen-Dazs putting its ice cream in steel containers. The Journal writes that prices for these products will be roughly the same as their plastic counterparts, but there will be a deposit of $1 – $10 per container (plus shipping). Shoppers order items through a website for home delivery and when they are done, schedule a pickup for the containers which will be cleaned and reused.

It’s always good to be skeptical of big brands whenever they appear to be making some kind of altruistic move–they are in business to make money, not save the planet. But this trial is coming at a time when people are waking up to just how much plastic waste we’re generating. National Geographic reports that 8.3 billion metric tons of plastic has been created over the past six decades and only 9 percent of it has been recycled. It gets worse, as U.S. plastic recycling was projected to decrease to just 4.4 percent last year.

The good news, though, is that a number of regulators, companies and startups are tackling the problem head on. Last year more than 60 countries introduced initiatives to ban single-use plastic. Companies like Starbucks and Disney and Hyatt are banning single use plastic straws. Vessel Works launched a reusable coffee cup program in Colorado. And zero waste grocery stores are starting to pop up.

Will all this activity move the needle for convenience-addicted shoppers (myself included) to ditch their old habits and try something new? The ease of buying the normal plastic containers will be a hard habit for a lot of people to break. Hopefully Pepsi, Nestlé and all the brands participating in this new trial will design a recycling program that works, stick with it and throw some of their considerable marketing muscle behind it to make it a success — and help make us move on from plastic.

The World is Reducing Plastic Straw Use — Will the U.S. Follow Suit?

Each year, Americans go through 380 billion single-use plastic bags. These bags can’t be recycled in your household bin; instead, you have to take them to special processing facilities, which generally means they just end up getting tossed into landfill or blowing around and getting stuck in tree branches.

Global Wildlife estimates that, if we continue using and disposing of plastic at current rates, by 2050 there will be more plastic than fish (by weight) in the ocean. In 2010 alone we generated 275 million tons of plastic waste globally, with roughly one-third of that ending up in the ocean. In fact, worldwide we only recycle 14% of all plastic waste — though some estimates put that number as low as 9%.

Governments and companies are trying to reduce these staggering stats with plastic use reduction initiatives. As of earlier this month, over 60 countries have introduced levees or bans to reduce single-use plastic consumption.

Consumers have been dutifully toting their reuseable shopping bags to the grocery store for years, but the new “cool” green initiative is saying to no plastic straws. Actor and environmental activist Adrian Grenier even launched a Twitter campaign to get people to #stopsucking.

Globally, several countries are taking big steps on this front. Last month the European Commission proposed a ban on 10 items that make up more than 70% of all litter in EU waters and beaches. Included on that list are single-use plastic items like straws, bags, and cotton buds. Scotland has promised to ban all plastic straws by 2019, the U.K. has announced similar plans, and Taiwan plans to ban all plastic cups and straws by 2030.

Foodservice companies are getting on board, too. In the U.K., major chains Wagamama’s and Pizza Express have already eliminated plastic straws from their restaurants. Coffee chain giant Costa Coffee will also remove plastic straws from its stores this year. As an alternative, most establishments are offering compostable straws made of paper or other biodegradable materials or giving customers the option to do without straws altogether. Some more upscale restaurants are also offering reusable straws made of glass or aluminum. And at Smart Kitchen Summit Europe this year, FoodPairing’s robot-created cocktails featured thick, uncooked pasta noodles as straws.

Soon these might be replaced with biodegradable options.

Stateside, we’re working on the straw issue — we’re just a little slower to the table. It all started here in Seattle, where the Lonely Whale has launched its first city campaign to support Strawless Ocean’s global campaign to eliminate 500 million plastic straws from the waste stream. Which is how many straws we use in the U.S. in one day. Starting July 1st, 10 years after the legislation was introduced, Seattle restaurants who use plastic spoons or cutlery will be fined $250.

Miami Beach, Malibu, and Edmonds, WA have adopted a simliar ban. New York recently proposed legislation to end plastic straw use by 2020, under which violators would have to pay a $100 fine.

In theory, a plastic straw ban is great. No more clogging up the oceans, no more injuring or killing sea turtles, and, thanks to biodegradable and resuable straw options, we don’t even have to give up on the pleasure of smoothie slurping. What’s not to love?

The path to adoption does have some hurdles, however. Paper straws can get soggy quickly. And biodegradable straws made of wheat or bamboo can cost 5-6 times more than straws made of regular plastic. Which means they might fly for fancier coffee shops and cafés, but it might take a while for fast food chains who are ordering millions and millions of straws per week to roll them out in huge numbers.

Though some giant restaurant chains are (at least trying to) switch over from plastic straws. In the U.K., McDonald’s started using paper drinking straws in 1,300 locations this May, and will expand the initiative to all of their locations in the U.K. and Ireland by September. According to U.S.A. Today, the fast food chain will start testing plastic straw alternatives in its U.S. stores later this year.

I have been personally guilted away from having a straw with my iced coffee several times. As have food-related retailers, producers, and distributors. Alaska Airlines halted plastic straw usage in May of this year. Bon Appétit Management, a foodservice company with 1,000 locations in museums, university campuses, and other institutions, promised to eliminate all plastic straws and stirrers by 2019.

Advocates are hoping that straws can become “gateway plastics,” leading to an anti-single use plastic revolution. Food-related companies are already starting to move away from non-recyclable plastic use. Last week investors pressured global corporations Nestlé, Unilever, PepsiCo and others to reduce their plastic packaging. In the U.S. Purple Carrot became the first meal kit service to make all of their plastic packaging home-recyclable, and startup Stasher has developed re-usable silicone bags intended for food storage or sous vide.

Until then, prepare to get some side-eyes if you opt for a plastic straw with your cold brew.