Pile of Plastic Silverware

Americans alone use and dispose of enough paper and plastic cups, forks, and spoons every year to circle the equator 300 times. Lets break this down, mathematically first (then we can physically break down the paper and plastics). If the circumference of the earth at the equator is 24,901.55 miles (a bit longer than measured at the poles), and there are 365 days in the year, then we dispose of 20,467.027 miles of disposable paper and plastic to go ware each day! That is about enough distance to stretch from the coast of Gabon (the westernmost country in Africa on the equator) all the way around the world to the eastern mouth of the Amazon in South America, every day!!!

If this startles you, consult your daily schedule and you will be surprised with how many disposable items we throw out daily. Here is a scenario for you: a gentleman goes out to lunch during his workday. He orders a sandwich and a side salad, with a fountain beverage. He orders it “to go” so he can sit in the park and eat in a more pleasant space. The food service worker wraps his sandwich in paper, puts it in a plastic bag, puts his salad that is in a plastic container in the plastic bag along with a prepackaged plastic silverware set equipped with paper packages of salt and pepper, and a paper napkin. He sits and enjoys his meal, and ends up throwing out more than half the volume of what he consumed.

An easy solution to ease the impact of disposables is to bring your own silverware to eat with and a bag to put your items in. I want to introduce you to a little product called to-go-ware. The company was started by Stephanie Bernstein who had an epiphany over a cup of ice cream “for here” that was dished in a paper cup with a plastic spoon. She decided to design a small package of utensils (spoon, fork, knife, chopsticks) made of bamboo that one can bring along with them daily. The utensils are kept in a cloth pouch (which serves as your napkin) that wraps up into a small long sleeve. You carry it around with you every day to avoid the result of our convenience culture.

The tragic thing about food service that is different than purchasing clothing, is that you cant really give back a disposable good once it has been given to you. In other words you can’t lick the ice cream off the spoon once they’ve stuck it in your cup and say, “thanks, but I brought my own! Can you reuse this?” It is certainly worth a try in order to stimulate a consideration, but it does not entirely meet food code. So, although to-go-ware is partially effective and a great product, we need to begin even deeper and earlier in the service-to-customer relationship. We need to be more proactive and make sure we tell our server to please leave out as many disposables as entirely possible.

I lived in New York City for the summer of 2003 and I used to go get iced coffee a few mornings of the week around the block. I remember being so startled upon receiving my simple small iced coffee because I also received the added value (waste) of 3 napkins, a straw, and a paper bag that they put my full (yet soon to be empty) disposable plastic cup in. I had to stop going there because they would neglect to meet my request of “no napkins or straw or lid or bag please”. It was the full package deal or nothing. This was when I really began to realize how many little things we throw out every day that often times are never even used. Our consumer driven convenience culture is in part supported by the service industry. Convenience is no longer a conscious decision to leverage; convenience is an assumed desire.

So, to prove the service industry otherwise make sure you request no-few disposables. Try this next time: When you call in you’re “to go” order for family dinner pizza, ask for no disposable silverware, no cups for the soda, and no plates with the pizza. And upon pickup bring your own tray or plate to take the pizza home on as opposed to taking it home in a large cardboard box. Of course there will have to be sacrifices, but like every change, once we get used to them, it no longer seems difficult or different.

To-Go-Ware
Tip o' the Day: Bring Your Own Coffee Mug

Image courtesy of To-Go Ware