Before the pandemic, Starbucks was a big proponent of people bringing in their own mugs and tumblers in an effort to be environmentally-conscious. However, when the pandemic started, they decided to suspend the program at least for the time being.
But now it is time to once again break out those tumblers and mugs so that we can stop getting disposable cups all the time. According to CNN, starting on June 22, we can once again bring a mug from home to get our Starbucks fix. However, since we are still technically in the time of COVID-19, there is a bit of a catch to all of this.
In order to use your mug from home, it must be clean. In the past, if a mug appeared dirty, the baristas would rinse it for you. But those days are long gone. If you want your Starbucks to end up in the mug you brought from home, then it better be clean. And that’s not all.
It seems that a clean mug (which should be obvious to everyone) is not the only change we will see.
Starbucks will let us start using our own mugs again on June 22
On top of only using clean reusable mugs, whatever we bring from home for our drink will have to fit inside of a “larger ceramic mug” that the baristas will hold. The point of this is to avoid the barista actually touching your mug.
Apparently the way this will all work is:
"a customer will place their own cup into a larger ceramic mug. The barista will hold the ceramic mug’s handle rather than the cup when preparing the drink. Once the beverage is ready, the customer will pick their cup up from within the mug. Personal mugs that don’t fit will be placed on trays."
While we are excited by the news that we will once again be able to think about the environment when it comes to getting our Starbucks fix, we have some questions. Does this mean we can bring in our cold cups again or is this strictly for hot drinks? Will this “larger ceramic mug” also fit the standard Venti tumblers they usually sell?
Really, we are excited by the return of this program, but we want clarification. But what do you think? Are you happy that Starbucks is letting us bring our own mugs again? Tell us in the comments below.