Get a Cafe onboard

How to encourage a cafe to join Responsible Cafes

As we are a group of passionate volunteers ourselves and rely on coffee drinkers to speak to their cafes and ask them what they are doing to solve this growing problem.

Here are some tips to help you approach some cafes in your local area:

1.

Step one: Start the conversation

If you haven’t already, approach your local cafe and have a chat with them about the concept. Some good conversation starters could be:

“Roughly how many people use their own cups for takeaway coffee here?”

“Would you consider offering a small discount if I brought in my own cup?”

“Cafes across Australia are offering discounts to customers with their own cup…would you guys consider this?”

“There is this great initiative called Responsible Cafes that is trying to encourage cafes to encourage people to use their own cup by reducing the cost of the coffee – great idea, no?! They even list participating cafes on a searchable online map and promote cafes on social media for free.”

“Did you know that over 3 BILLION TAKEAWAY CUPS are used in Australia each year – and almost none of these are recycled?”

2.

Step two: What’s in it for them

Once you have a cafe that is interested in learning more, talk to them about the key benefits of joining:

  • The cafe will be posted on our searchable interactive map on the website which currently gets over 1000 unique hits a month
  • We will provide them with downloadable posters and other promotional material to help spread their message and get support from their customers
  • They will increase customer loyalty as people with their own cup are more likely to return due to the discount
  • And of course, they can feel great about contributing to the reduction of waste and ecological damage to our beautiful world!

3.

Step three: It is SO easy to register

Your cafe can decide what discount they would like to offer but most offer 30-50c, some up to $1 off. You can either register their cafe on their behalf or they can register themselves via our website – it takes less than 2 minutes! Just scroll down to the part that says “Join the movement”.

4.

Step four: Getting the word out there

Once your cafe has signed up it is now their job to get the word out there. Here are some tools we have created to help you do that:

We have a poster for them to print out which they can pop up in the cafe and tell their customers about their commitment.

Take a photo of your cafe owner next to the poster with their thumbs up or holding a reusable cup with big smile – have some fun! Share it to social media with the #ResponsibleCafes and this will be included on our social stream on the website

5.

Step five: Keep checking in

Thanks to you, your cafe is good to go! Keep checking in with them and see how they are going with the scheme. Have they noticed interest from their customers? Is their poster still up? Is there anything else we can do to help them spread the word? We would love to feedback so we can keep bettering the scheme for our network of hardworking cafes.

We are putting together an information sheet you can use to arm yourself with the key stats to educate your cafe, as well as a poster you can leave with them. Check back soon to download it.