Starbucks has been under fire in the media spotlight for a while after some of their employees and managers turned out to be horribly racist.
Since the scandals made the company look rather bad, the coffee chain has since issued some brand new rules and regulations in their stores. For one, they now have a brand new policy where anyone can use the bathroom–even if they don’t order something. They then rolled out the policy that people are allowed to sit in their stores and not order anything as well–saving them from all of the harassment and racism issues (or so they think).
Now, to keep the ball rolling for the coffee chain, Starbucks has issued an initiative to go “straw-less” with their iced drinks and coffee beverages. In case you don’t realize, plastic is horrible for the environment and well, for everyone. If you add up the number of iced coffees you drink and think about how many straws you end up throwing away–you’re contributing to global warming more often than you think.
Starbucks is trying to make us all into good citizens of the world by introducing these brand-spanking’ new cups that don’t require any straw at all.
Ideally, the cups weren’t originally made to save the world–in fact, they were rolled out with Starbucks’ Nitro Cold Brew, so people could “enjoy the foam at the top of their drink.” However, these cups can be requested for any cold drink you order in stores that carry them (which, according to BuzzFeed, is over 1,400 locations).
People on Twitter have been excited/impressed by them.
Why doesn’t starbucks use these lil sippy cup lids from their iced Cappuccinos for all their iced drinks???? And just eleminate using plastic straws altogether??? ? (literally every coffee shop could do this) pic.twitter.com/V4QKXn90wC
— emily (@em0wen) May 22, 2018
I like the new @Starbucks cold sippy cup lids. This is a great alternative to the environmental nightmare of plastic straws. pic.twitter.com/7Tuj5Z3q7f
— Karen Petronis (@klpbirds) May 23, 2018
Yo @Starbucks loving the sippy cup too ?? pic.twitter.com/0n077ryKPk
— No Sleep Records (@nosleeprecords) June 4, 2017
STRAWLESS LIDS ARE A THING AT STARBUCKS NOW! Ask for them!!!!! It's an adult sippy cup!!! be cool! this is cool guys!!! ???? pic.twitter.com/9oEmpMVIOe
— jay ? freestyle sessions (@_princesssjay) May 3, 2018
Im so excited for my starbucks omorrow like now that i know that they are okay with repacing th ids so its the sippy cup lid im very excited
— Aditi ? (@officialaditi) May 25, 2018
But, someone pointed out that using a plastic cup is just as bad as using a plastic straw. I mean, he has a point–the plastic cups are most definitely worse than all of those straws, right?
LADIES: men? How about enviroMENt?? If you think I asked the voice box at Starbucks for a sippy cup lid instead of a straw lid, you thought right. Never mind the irony that I’m contributing to plastic waste by ordering a iced coffee in the first place, I saved earth from a STRAW pic.twitter.com/p2cFoA8C6g
— 2014 toyota prius (@bneerahula) May 24, 2018
I’ll be honest–I’m intrigued. I’m not going to lie that I’m a bit jealous when my nephew gets to use a sippy cup for his juice but it’s socially inappropriate for me to drink wine out of one. But, let’s face it, sippy cups are not always the best–like, if I’m driving in my car and hit a massive pothole (because I live in NYC and potholes are…everywhere), I can bet my last dollar I’ll be taking a trip to the car wash because that sippy cup will spill coffee everywhere. Sounds like an epic fail to me.