CupClub

CupClub™ offers a tailored end-to-end service helping to reduce single-use plastic packaging by up to 47%.

An estimated 600 billion coffee cups are thrown out every year, which also means 600 billion plastic lids and 600 billion pieces of paper coated in plastic insulation. And these can't be recycled. 

In 2015, Safia Qureshi and Maxwell Mutanda had created Studio [D] Tale using design to create high-impact change in cities and decided to create a circular system for cups that would be easily adopted by both coffee shops and coffee drinkers. This system would allow customers to throw out their used cup into a collection center, rather than the trash. And CupClub was officially launched in June 2019. 

The company creates plastic cups that can be used 132 times before being recycled. They are designed to be used in coffee shops. There are cup drop-off points available throughout London—primarily in participating coffee shops—so when a customer is done with his drink, it can simply be tossed in one of these bins.

CupClub manages the collect of these used cups, cleans them using industrial dishwashers, and redistributes them to coffee shops.

The cups and lid out of low-density polypropylene are fully recyclable. CupClub is tracking these cups as each cup is fitted with an RFID chip that makes it identifiable throughout its entire life cycle.

Customers need to opt in to be part of CupClub. They download an app, and whenever they are at a coffee shop that makes these cups available, they can use the service. If the cup hasn't been returned after several days, CupClub assumes the customer wants to keep the cup, and they are charged $3 for it.

CupClub™ partners are:

• Offices, headquarters & in-house cafes
• Closed-loop campus & venues: CupClub™ is ideal for closed-loop venues and campus environments (including government departments, universities and institutions)
• Airports are also an emerging and exciting application
• Festivals or events: CupClub provides cups, drop-off cases and communications

The team consists of technologists, designers and engineers, as well as an extended network of strategic advisors. It is backed by institutional investors R/GA Ventures, the investment arm of global digital agency R/GA which counts clients like Nike, Siemens, and Beats.

CupClub innovation has been selected by the NextGenCup Challenge team among 12 ideas for their reusable cup service model. It has been awarded as well the 2017 Ellen MacArthur Foundation’s New Plastics Economy Innovation Prize and joined the 2018 R/GA IoT Venture Studio Accelerator.