Tainan has partnered with fast food chain McDonald’s Taiwan and launched three new service stations for cup-sharing platform Good to Go, which enable users to borrow and return reusable cups free of charge.
The three new Good to Go service stations have been set up outside three McDonald’s branches on Dasyue Road (大學路), Simen Road (西門路) and Dongmen Road Sec 2 (東門路), the city said.
The cup-sharing platform is part of the city government’s efforts to promote the circular economy while helping to protect the environment, Tainan Mayor Huang Wei-che (黃偉哲) said on Sept. 14.
Photo courtesy of McDonald’s
Although the service is operated by a private company, it is free and fully funded by the city government.
He thanked the fast-food company and other partnered businesses for launching special promotions to encourage their customers to use the reusable cups provided by the platform.
McDonald’s customers who buy a drink or soup at any of its branches in Tainan with a Good to Go cup would be rewarded with three points on their point-accumulation card, the company said.
Five points can be exchanged for a free drink worth NT$33, it added.
The company is pleased to collaborate with the platform, Lin Li-wen (林麗文), vice president of McDonald’s supply chain management, said in a statement.
She said she hopes the use of reusable cups will become ubiquitous in the city.
McDonald’s has a huge customer base and setting up the cup-sharing stations outside its branches would introduce more people to the sharing platform, said Hsieh Shih-chieh (謝世傑), director-general of the city’s Environmental Protection Bureau.
Tainan recycled 4.78 million kilograms of disposable tableware in the first half of this year, an annual increase of nearly 400,000kg compared with last year, Hsieh said.
In addition to providing drinks to Good to Go users, McDonald’s would also pay the electricity bills of the three new service stations, Hsieh said.
The Last Longer Project, which developed and operates the cup-sharing platform, opened its first service station in 2019 and now has six stations across Tainan, with financial support from the city government, McDonald’s said.
To use the cup-sharing service, users have to sign up at a service station, after which they can use up to six reusable cups at a time at either a station or a partnered beverage shop in the city, the company said.
Users are required to return the cups within six days of their use at one of the six stations or 50 partnered shops, the company said, otherwise, their membership would be suspended until the cups are returned, it added.
The cups, which come in two sizes, and their lids are made of polypropylene, and each cup can be used 300 to 500 times before being discarded, McDonald’s said.
The cleaning service it works with cleans and disinfects used cups in line with Taiwan Food and Drug Administration standards, the company added.
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