Air New Zealand trials edible coffee cups
Air New Zealand is trialing vanilla-flavoured edible cups in place of throw-away ones in a bid to reduce its waste. The plant-based cups are made from paper and corn instead of plastic, which enables the cup to break down in a commercial composter. According to the airline’s 2019 sustainability report, Air New Zealand emits around 3.5 million tonnes of carbon dioxide annually, making it one of the country’s largest emitters.
Currently serving more than eight million cups of coffee each year to its passengers in the air, Air New Zealand recently switched to plant-based cups. Having begun trialing edible coffee cups as it explores new and innovative ways to meet its sustainability challenges, the change is expected to prevent around 15 million cups from going to landfill each year. The airline is also encouraging customers to bring their own reusable cups on board aircraft and into its lounges.
Air New Zealand Senior Manager Customer Experience – Niki Chave explains that while the cups are compostable, the ultimate goal would be to remove these totally from landfills."We've been working in partnership with innovative New Zealand company 'twiice' to explore the future of edible coffee cups, which are vanilla flavoured and leak proof. The cups have been a big hit with the customers who have used these and we've also been using the cups as dessert bowls," she goes on to add.
Excited by the results of the initiative demonstrating that new and innovative ways of packaging were achievable, ‘twiice’ co-founder, Jamie Cashmore said “It’s terrific that Air New Zealand has partnered with us to showcase to its customers and the world that little bit of kiwi ingenuity and innovation could have a really positive impact on the environment while at the same time delivering a really cool and tasty customer experience”. Mr. Cashmore also disclosed that ‘twiice’ is working on extending its edible range of crockery and expects to rollout new products next year.
While Air New Zealand’s edible cup initiative has received a lot of positive comments – some on social media have suggested that cancelling a flight a week to London would be a more effective way of reducing the impact on the environment. Maybe…and yet cancelling flights could disappoint customers as well as drive airfare up.
Report sourced out by in2ition
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