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BREAKING: DEMONSTRATIONS AT 22 @STARBUCKS STORES ACROSS 11 STATES CALL ON COFFEE GIANT TO STOP LYING ABOUT PLASTICS RECYCLING The demonstrations in Massachusetts, New York, Arizona, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Vermont, California, Illinois, Colorado, Washington and Texas are part of a Starbucks Week of Action urging the company to stop telling customers that its single-use plastic cold cups are “widely recyclable,” after a nationwide tracking investigation by Beyond Plastics could not confirm a single cup being recycled. Beyond Plastics, its partners, and demonstrators nationwide are calling on Starbucks to: -Stop portraying its single-use plastic cold cups as “widely recyclable” when the company cannot demonstrate that the cups are actually being recycled at scale. -Remove images and messaging that may lead customers to believe Starbucks plastic cups placed in store recycling bins will be recycled. -Honor existing Starbucks policy of providing reusable cups for beverages consumed inside the store. -Replace plastic cups for their cold drinks with fiber-based cups. “Customers who carefully put their Starbucks cup into a recycling bin with an image of a plastic cold cup on it reasonably expect it to be recycled,” said @enckj, president of Beyond Plastics and a former EPA regional administrator, who plans to join the demonstration at an Albany, NY, store Saturday. “Our investigation found something very different. Not one of the cups we successfully tracked was confirmed recycled. Starbucks needs to stop misleading customers about plastic recycling and focus instead on reducing single-use plastic and expanding reusable and plastic-free alternatives.”

Beyond Plastics conducted a three-month nationwide tracker investigation to test @starbucks' claim that its single-use polypropylene (No. 5 plastic) cold beverage cups are recyclable. Not a single tracked cup ended up at a recycling facility. Misleading customers about plastic recycling deflects from the real issue: growing plastic production that contributes to the plastic pollution crisis and its harm, especially to environmental justice communities where production plants, petrochemical facilities, landfills, and incinerators are often sited. The real solution to this massive waste problem is not in recycling plastic, but in companies like Starbucks using less of it, investing in reusable cups and foodware, and incorporating safer, more sustainable packaging when disposable packaging is unavoidable. Sign our petition to ask Starbucks to reduce its use of single-use plastic at beyondplastics.org/actions/s… Help us get 5,000 signatures! We're over halfway there.