Earlier this month, Starbucks (SBUX -0.40%) announced plans to reduce single-use plastics in its stores in the coming years. By the end of 2023, for instance, the coffee chain plans to allow customers to reuse their personal cups at its locations in the U.S. and Canada. On this episode of "Ask Us Anything" on Motley Fool Live, recorded on March 18, Fool.com contributor Jason Hall discusses the company's plans and its green initiatives through the years.
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Jason Hall: This is something that Starbucks has actually been working on for a long time. I'm going to drop a link in the Slido for Starbucks' press release about it. I'm going to read one of the bullet points right here. Commits to providing easy access to personal or Starbucks-provided reusable to-go cups in cafe, drive-thru, and mobile order and pay by 2025. They're saying within three years you can walk in with your cup, you can drive through with your cup, you can mobile order with your cup. When you get there, leave with that coffee in your cup. They also have a plan for customers who don't bring in their own cup, where you pay a deposit and you get a reusable cup that you take with you, and the next time you are at Starbucks, there's a bin you throw it in. And they're looking to use a third-party company to clean those and then redeliver them to the stores so that they can be reused. They're trying to build out the operational side of it for the reusable cups, and then they are trying to figure out the operational side and the logistics of it for people when they come in with a cup of their own that they want to use. I think this is a lot more than aspirational. This is a company that over the years has consistently made little steps to improve and reduce its environmental footprint. Go back to the straws thing. Of course, there was all political football that was made out of getting straws out of their stores. All they did was they changed to a lid that's made out of the same recyclable plastic as the cups. They can function as a straw. Nobody talks about it anymore because it's totally fine. It's Change Management 101. Everybody freaks out, makes a big deal about it, then everything is fine once they get used to it. They just have to get a process that's truly as friction free for customers as possible.
