Tully’s “green” cup

     I was given a Tully’s gift card a couple of weeks ago. Out of the city of Seattle it isn’t as popular as Starbucks, but if you pay attention there is probably one near you. I went into the Bothell store on Thursday, which is a few minutes from my office to get my drink, a tall vanilla soy latte. Waiting patiently by the counter I marveled at how much it looked like Starbucks and yet how different it was. But that is not why I post. My coffee came in a more squat cup than Starbucks uses and it said, “ Tully’s Green Cup is 100% Compostable”. Really? Well that’s cool, only wish I had a composter to use.
     This morning I hopped online to see what I could learn about this thing. I have read the press release from Tully’s
, a Seattle P.I.
article and a quicky post on the The Resposible Marketing Blog.
     It seems that the cup is compostable because of it’s bio-plastic lining that replaces the petrol based lining to prevent leaky cups. Great! Tully’s has also implemented a recycling option for customers. Bring in your cup and they will send it out to be composted for you at one of two locations in either Everett or Maple Valley. That means that it is up to us to bring back our cups to be properly, eco-friendly disposed of. Also great! Right? Well, the liner is made out of corn. I don’t want to criticize a company that is trying, whether for the good of the world or the good of their bank accounts, to better themselves. But corn isn’t the best thing in the world. It is the first completely genetically altered “food”. Corn came from maize, and through hundreds or thousands of years, farmers altered it to produce more to feed more. Problem with that is we do not digest it, so it is only a filler food. Do we really want fillers composted into our soil? In turn it will end up in our food as it is used for fertilizer. As many of us know, compost is very nutrient rich and many times is used in place of synthetic fertilizers.
     I think in this case, it is the lesser of two evils – for now. It is much better than our beloved coffee cups ending up in landfills, though to be fair, many of these “green” cups will end up in landfills anyway. It is a start, and hopefully more companies will follow suit. Hopefully, also a new option will be discovered and thoroughly researched that isn’t corn based.