7-Eleven and Simply Cups have reached a new milestone, saving 20 million single-use cups from going into landfill.

Simply Cups is the country’s first coffee-cup recycling program that collects used takeaway cups – including straws and plastic lids – and upcycles them into products like reusable cups, coffee trays, and even furniture.

“We have more than 660 cup recycling units installed in our stores, and there are hundreds of other recycling stations we’ve supported being installed in schools and other locations,” said Angus McKay, CEO and MD at 7-Eleven Australia.

The two companies teamed up in 2018 to work to reduce the amount of cups being wasted.

The collaboration also launched a 7-Eleven #CupRescue program that offers recycling infrastructure to schools and encourages young people to champion reducing single-use cups in their local communities.

“We’ll provide participating schools with free cup-collection units to enable students and staff to collect cups at their school. All the school needs to do is collect cups and drop them off at their partnering 7-Eleven store,” said Mckay.

Since launching in 2020, the #CupRescue program has gone live in 100 schools across the country and hopes to encourage more to join the cause.

“Twenty million cups recycled is a great number to reach, but we want to increase the rate of recycling,” McKay added.