With many around the country having declared war on disposable coffee cups, Canberra cafes are doing their bit to help reduce waste, with one even banning them altogether.
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Gungahlin cafe Frankies at Forde will no longer serve disposable cups from July 1.
"We did the numbers on it, we use about 45,000 of those disposable cups a year and we sort of think that people can either spare themselves the five minutes to have a coffee here or we'll sell them a reusable Keep Cup, just to stop all that stuff going to landfill," said owner Mark Ramsay said.
"We're just a little cafe out in the suburbs and the sheer volume of takeaway cups we do is mind boggling."
Instead of disposable takeaway cups, customers can choose to dine in, purchase a reusable cup for $10, or bring their own.
"When customers buy a Keep Cup from us, we'll shout them their first coffee for doing the right thing. Then they leave it in their car or their office to use every time they go and get a coffee and hopefully we can put a dent in the amount of cups used in the area," Mr Ramsay said.
Since making the announcement, Ramsay said the reaction from the public has been, "hugely positive", and they will continue to educate customers on the new process over the coming weeks.
Many other Canberra venues are offering a discount for those who BYO cup, like Coffee Lab in Civic where customers get a 50c discount.
Manager Steph Urosevic said Coffee Lab has offered the discount since they opened 18 months ago, but have seen a sharp increase in people taking it up since promoting the discount more recently.
"I reckon about a quarter of our customers are bringing in their cups now," she said.
"We just get customers to hold onto their own lid and it's just as smooth as the normal process. And it's kind of nice as well because they can watch out for their personalised cups rather than just listening out, because it does get really loud in the cafe."
Ms Urosevic said the busy cafe goes through around 2000 disposable cups a week.
"I'd love to see down the track, like how in the ACT they've banned plastic shopping bags, I'd love to see it go that way with coffee cups because it's such a huge pollutant," she said.
Ave Cafe in Turner has introduced a reusable cup exchange program to encourage customers to ditch disposable cups.
The venue, which offers coffee orders via an app and drive through pick up, lets customers select to be part of the exchange each time they order. Customers just need to purchase a cup initially through the app or provide their own to be part of the exchange.
"When I come and run their coffee out to them, they give me the dirty cup and I give them the clean one full of coffee and then I wash that one," said Ave Cafe owner Stephen Ning.
"People find it convenient because they just drink the coffee in the car and when they want to reorder coffee, their cup is already there."
You can find a list of cafes offering discounts for those who bring their own cup at responsiblecafes.org.
