Weekender: Harrogate cafe to ban disposable cups

Baltzersen’s, a Scandinavian cafe based in Harrogate, has announced it will no longer offer guests disposable cups.

From May 14, customers must either bring their own reusable cup or purchase one from a new range the cafe will have available in store for £10.

This isn’t the cafe’s first sustainability scheme; in 2016 Baltzersen’s installed a free still and sparkling water font in the cafe which was recently added to the Refill app, an Ordnance Survey backed map that logs locations you can fill up your reusable water bottle for free.

In March, the cafe stopped serving plastic straws with cold drinks as standard, opting instead to make paper straws available if required.

Baltzersen’s owner Paul Rawlinson says businesses are big consumers and have a huge impact on the environment across a whole range of functions, so removing the option of disposable cups is “just a tiny improvement, but it all adds up.”

“It’s likely we’ll miss out on some custom and have to direct some guests to alternative options if they haven’t got a reusable cup or aren’t willing to purchase one, which could have a negative effect on us as an independent business,” he said.

Annual coffee cup usage is estimated at somewhere between 2.5 and 3.75 billion cups per year, almost none of which are recycled because of their plastic lining.

“We’ve always taken great care to support other local businesses. We buy organic milk direct from a local dairy and our roasters source our coffee ethically, so it only makes sense that we now turn our focus to how we serve our hot drinks,” says Rawlinson.

“Being so deeply rooted within our community we have these important conversations about sustainability face-to-face with our guests every day and to us it’s clear that this is a tipping point.

“Reducing plastic waste is something we can all take action on, and we’re choosing to start now.”