Melbourne café Napier Quarter has announced it will ban takeway coffee from 21 December to encourage customers to sit down and enjoy their beverage while reducing their environmental footprint.
Owner Daniel Lewis told the Sydney Morning Herald the ban came about after he couldn’t find a bin for the café’s biodegradable cups.
“I started trying to research a company you can use that hires a bin for people to biodegrade coffee cups,” says Lewis. “I thought the whole purpose of having a plastic bin to do that is counter intuitive. I thought we just need to go back to the source of the problem.”
Takeaway coffee makes up 25 per cent of Napier Quarter’s morning business, but Lewis has cut the price of coffee from $4 to $3.50 in an effort to appease customers who ordered coffee to go.
“I’m trying to get people to savour the experience of having a coffee,” he says.
“There is a conglomerate of people standing around with backpacks, on their phones, and it takes away from the experience. It’s turning into a takeaway generation; it’s not what we are about.”
Image credit: Gareth Sobey, Broadsheet