Starbucks is killing its iconic green straws, and it wants people to drink out of a 'sippy cup' instead
- Starbucks announced on Monday that it plans to eliminate single-use plastic straws by 2020.
- A new lid - which looks a lot like a child's sippy cup - allows customers to drink cold beverages without a straw and is key to the plan to ditch plastic straws at the chain.
- The new recyclable, strawless lids are already in use in certain stores with particular beverages, such as drinks that come with a cold foam topping.
Starbucks is eliminating straws - and its plan involves a design that looks like a child's sippy cup.
On Monday, the coffee chain announced that it plans to no longer use single-use plastic straws around the world by 2020. In addition to creating new straws made from alternative materials instead of plastic, Starbucks plans to push cups with a new lid that does not require a straw.
The new recyclable, strawless lids are already in use in certain stores with particular beverages, such as drinks with a cold foam topping.
One notable thing about the new cups: they look distinctly like a child's sippy cup.
Environmentally minded individuals on social media have been encouraging customers to ask for the sippy cup - as opposed to the straw - for a few months now as the lids have become available in Starbucks locations across the United States.
As more stores have added the lid and drinks that are meant to be consumed via sippy cup, more people have taken note of the new design.
Emily Alexander, an engineer in global research and development at Starbucks, developed the sippy cup lid to pair with the chain's nitro cold brew. The drink's bubbles and cold foam were created to be sipped - not sucked up via straw.
Over the next two years, however, the chain will be making the sippy cup the standard for most cold drinks. Starbucks will roll out the initatives to eliminate straws in phases, a company spokesperson told Business Insider. The changes will start in Seattle, Washington, and Vancouver, Canada, this fall, with the rest of the world following by 2020.