Sharing a Cup of Coffee in the City: Think Coffee's Case

I've worked at coffee shops for a nearly embarrassing amount of time. I hand out hundreds of paper cups a day only to see them in the garbage on the corner just outside my shop when I leave work, which suggests to me that they were used for (and I'll be generous) twenty minutes.



Guest Blogger: Mia Schachter

In the last several years, "green" cups have cropped up -- cold cups are made of corn and hot cups are made of potatoes. These cups are compostable, which means that even if they don't make it into a commercial composting facility to be churned into fertilizer, they won't sit in a landfill for hundreds or thousands of years. From my year-long stint selling coffee and coffee products wholesale, I know that these cups are substantially more expensive than the ones you get from the bodega. Choosing to sell coffee in these cups is a calculated and deliberate choice to be conscious about the waste produced at a shop.

For some of us, refusing plastic takeout containers and bringing our own bags to the grocery store is something of a hobby. We seek out ways to be more self-sufficient and feel guilty when we forget our Klean Kanteen. For others, it's an obligation. And for still others, it's merely a welcome bonus if our coffee cup happens to be compostable.

I no longer work at Think Coffee, but as far as I can tell, it is doing the most of any coffee shop to reduce waste. Think Coffee almost exclusively offers compostable to-go materials. Considering the existence of companies like Greenware, which specialize in these sustainable products, one might think it would be easy to use exclusively compostable goods. It's not.

The container your salad comes in might be compostable, but those little ones your salad dressing comes in? Maybe not. Your cup might be, but not the straw, because the only compostable straws I've seen crunch in your mouth and break easily. Hot lids often shrink and expand with extreme heat, and you asked for your latte extra hot, to which I begrudgingly obliged, but now your lid is dripping, or it split when you put it on the cup. They are designed to break down easily, unlike plastic, but sometimes the breaking down starts a little too quickly, as in while it's in your hand.

Think Coffee has compostable wax paper, utensils, bags, napkins and clam-shell takeout boxes. But once you've got the stuff, you leave.

Think Coffee also has a garbage sorting station, the fanciest of which is at its 8th Avenue location. Each hole is cut in an image of the type of thing that can go in there. While it's confusing and tedious, it's the only way to offer the opportunity to care to those who do. And when in doubt, the "landfill" hole is the safe bet.

There is a Portlandia sketch about a garbage sorting station on steroids with color coding and a tiny box exclusively for nail clippings. What they fail to mention is that if you fail to sort your garbage and your stuff doesn't make it into the composting hole at a Think Coffee location, you can still rest easy that it will eventually decompose somewhere.

Our world is outfitted for garbage. The movie WALL-E served as fair warning that our garbage disposal methods themselves are not sustainable. Action Carting, a company that sends garbage trucks around the city picking up contracted shops' compost, provides a necessary service for shockingly cheap. It surprises me that there aren't composting cans next to every garbage in the city considering how cheap it is. Farmers’ markets often offer composting stations where you can bring your household waste.  

My household compost pales in comparison with the compost gathered at a Think Coffee, which only reminds me how fantastic it is that they put in the effort to make the most use out of everything that comes through their doors. Food scraps, coffee grinds, newspapers (yes, you can compost newspaper) all make it into the compost. The real cost is the effort it takes to initially set up a contract with Action and to order the appropriate goods, and then the time invested in education for employees.

It's hard to notice when goods we receive are compostable. Other than things we would actually put in our mouths and swallow, cups and utensils are assumed to be garbage. One actually has to read the fine print on cups to notice that they are made from corn. Just as vegetarians often believe that they are exercising their power by simply removing themselves from an action, one can witness the power of removal by refusing to participate in the kind of passive consumerism that occurs when we waste.

I've served enough coffees that are left untouched to know that often we consume merely in order to participate in a collective social hobby. The new hobby that has come to the forefront of the hip and trendy is the attention to one's carbon footprint. Among the foils of the meat industry, people can be overheard discussing their transportation habits, their consumption habits, and ways they reduce waste.

And all this over a cup of coffee.

<About Our Guest Blogger>

Mia Schachter 

Mia has been a barista in Los Angeles, Austin, and New York for almost six years. She is part time student at Columbia University's School of General Studies, studying Philosophy.  She currently works at Irving Farms on the Upper West Side.

Recycling at the London Olympics: A New Community in the East End

After the 17 days of competition, the London Olympics ended yesterday. Were you excited to see last night's Closing Ceremony? What do you think of the Spice Girls?

The British government earmarked an extra $64.3 million to double budget for the opening and closing ceremonies for the celebration. The Olympics is about our hope that people across borders can be united under one roof in the spirit of sportsmanship.

But after all the competition and celebration, have you ever wondered what happens to Olympics sites after the events are over?

Beijing's deserted Olympics site now
David Gray/Reuters

The other day, I found such a sad picture of Beijing's deserted Olympics site. It has been four years since Beijing hosted a spectacular summer Olympics. As with every Olympics, China's bustling capital prepared by vastly improving its public transportation and building extensive new infrastructure. However many of the venues built for the event have long since been neglected and, underused, draining public finances and seemingly being totally abandoned.

"The main "Bird's Nest" stadium" and the "Water Cube" aquatics center were regarded as the crown jewels among other buildings that pleased many eyes and raised much attention globally. They were described by International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogge as "beautiful" and "unprecedented" venues, and they certainly helped one billion sports enthusiasts get excited about the Olympics.

Yet today, the original purpose of both places has been forgotten, and now they are better known for the steady stream of curious tourists they attract -- some 4.61 million people in 2011. While the Bird’s Nest now hosts the odd soccer match or track and field competition from time to time, it has also been the site of a "winter wonderland" theme park as well as concerts. The stadium's management estimates that, at the current rate, it will take some three decades to recoup the three billion yuan ($480-million) cost of building it.

The neighboring Water Cube lost an estimated 11 million yuan last year, even with a state subsidy and revenue from an attached water park built after the Olympics to capitalize on its fame.

However, the London Olympics is becoming known as the most sustainable Olympics event ever hosted. One of the notable differences with past Olympics events is that the London Olympics has been the first to set up a London Legacy Development Corporation (LLDC) right from the start. LLDC is a public-sector, not-for-profit organization that is responsible for the long-term planning, development, management and maintenance of the Olympic Park and its facilities after the 2012 Games.

Artist conception of Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park

In May 2012, LLDC unveiled its plans for the opening of the future Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park.

LLDC's plan will see the park be transformed from an Olympics site into a brand-new piece of the city, right in the heart of London’s East End, in the 18 months following October 2012. By spring 2014, the 560-acre Olympic Park will become an exciting new visitor destination and community park, unlike any other in the U.K.

Historically, the East End has suffered from under-investment in both housing and infrastructure, and this is the reason for one of the recent initiatives to transform the area into a new community. The Olympic Park was created on former industrial land around the River Lea.

The mayor of London, Boris Johnson, had this to say about the park:

“Within a year of the close of the 2012 Games, the park will be ready to welcome not only another major sporting event, but also the thousands of residents and workers who will reap the benefits of this brand new district of the capital. The fantastic new sporting venues are only one part of the unfolding legacy story. The park will help drive the growth London needs to steer it out of recession and on to long term prosperity.”

The first area will re-open in July 2013 – exactly one year after the Olympics opening ceremony.

Recently there has been much criticism about the meaning of the Olympics. Flying thousands of athletes by jets to one city generates criticism globally in terms of a carbon footprint, and the event has become increasingly commercialized. The London Olympics has been also praised as the most sustainable, but, it is also reported that ticket sales have been disappointing.

While the city of London regards the overall event commercially unsuccessful in generating explosive sales, it might be disastrous if British officials are looking only at a short-term gain through this event. Fortunately, London has already a long-term plan: recycling the Olympics site to build a better community.

Hosting the Olympics to impress other member of nations is passé. What has become more important is to focus on the long-term goal of creating a space for the local community using the Games as an opportunity. We need to learn how to incorporate the growth of communities after each Olympics and look forward to this after the big event.

What do you think of the plan for site of the London Olympics?

New Distribution Model: How to "Relocalize" Our Food and Community

One typical summer weekend afternoon, I was having a relaxing brunch with some close friends at my neighborhood's outdoor cafe in NYC.   I casually asked one friend "How is your mother doing these days?"  My friend took a quick breath and told us, "My mother in Spain is doing fine but her concern is the current state of Spain.  I, too, can't believe how bad it recently has  become"    She was clearly upset and explained how her Spain friends' Facebook updates have described their lives have gotten worse and worse and been turned upside down.   

After Spain went through the Franco's dictatorship, people of Spain finally gained freedom just a few decades ago.   I can imagine how desperate her mother and friends in Spain must feel about the country falling apart now.   Listening to her, I thought of my friends and family in Japan, who are going through a big shift right now, and wondered how we all got here.                                              

  

As a result of greed and lack of accountability in a small segment of population or, approximately 1% , we have recently experienced a financial crisis and recession that we have never seen before in history.  The crisis just started in one country and one sector, but it has had a huge impact across the globe.  The globalized economy is clearly at a crossroads. 

So, where should we go from here?  Where should we look for the "new" economy that we can trust and rebuild our life upon?  

I realized then that there is already a new movement happening around us if we look closer and connect some of the dots.

Real Food Works founder
Lucinda Duncalfe (right) and me

During a recent interview, Lucinda Duncalfe, the serial entrepreneur, award winning professional and founder of Real Food Works, mentioned that she was first inspired by Forks Over Knives, a documentary describing how a plant-based diet will prevent most degenerative diseases. Her new venture delivers plant-based foods prepared by independent local chefs to subscribed clients, and her goal is to create happiness and more energy in her clients' lives.   

I also recently attended a meeting for  "food+tech", a Meetup group whose purpose is to harness Web-based tools to communicate about food, provide information about food in a new and meaningful way.   At the meeting, a group of great innovators in food distribution were introduced to over 70 attendees.  Here are some things I learned about some of the new start-ups out there:

• Relay Foods is disrupting the largest retail category – groceries, while also efficiently connecting farm and fork.
•  Appetude is a social network that lets users discover, share, and order dishes online.  
• FarmersWeb is an online marketplace where wholesale buyers can connect and transact with local farms.
• Wholeshare helps people get access to good quality, affordable local food by organizing group purchases.

What's more, I learned these new things are not only happening in the start-up scene in NYC.   A recent Wired article reported that Mike Roberts, former president and chief operating officer of McDonald's, started a sustainable food chain called Lyfe Kitchen.   He pulled together two of Oprah’s celebrity chefs, Art Smith and Tal Ronnen and created a team for Lyfe Kitchen.  Roberts hopes to transform the way the world produces organic ingredients, promoting responsibly grown meat and veggies.  

Through their new businesses and innovations, we - consumers - are able to develop a local community and re-create the connection with food sources -- they help us "relocalize."  Because of the way we eat, we have destroyed our connection with the community, with the natural processes, with those who grow our food, and with the essence of life.   Our awareness, facing a daunting predicament with the way we’re producing and consuming our food, actually has inspired some of us to create these new businesses. 

Going back to my earlier question, Where should we go from here at the cross-roads?   The issues around the globalized economy seem to be huge and complex.  Spain's economy won't be remedied tomorrow.   Japan's issues concerning nuclear power will take decades to see any resolutions.   However, I believe that we will be able to address these global issues by bringing a new value into our daily life, such as a new way of viewing and treating our food.   

In short, we must learn how to eat seasonally and locally.  We must develop new skills and knowledge -- composting, cooking, sharing, creating communities, and relocalizing.

What do you think about local food?   What is your view on the huge shift in the world?

New Yorkers seeking locally grown apples
in Union Sq. Green Market