Last week, Europe’s 3rd largest airport (Holland’s largest) Schiphol Airport, announced that plastic water bottles would no longer be sold at the 12 stores the Airport manages. The move, Schiphol Airport calculates, will eliminate the waste of a staggering 750,000 single-use plastic bottles every year!
Instead, commuters will be encouraged to bring their own reusable drink bottles which they will be able to refill from a water station installed by the Airport. The new water station will also look to educate commuters by displaying data regarding the amount of water people used to fill their bottles and the number of disposable plastic water bottles that did not enter the market as a result.
Although this is the first major airport to adopt this policy, a network of refill stations is already being established in train stations and shopping centres across Europe. To locate over 300,000 refill stations worldwide offering water, coffee, food containers and plastic-free shopping, check out Refill.
Since 2019, EU countries are obligated to reduce the use of single-use packaging, even for plastics that are recyclable. In 2020, the EU set the course for a circular economy as part of the European Green Deal initiative. These measures are part of the overall European strategy to combat plastic waste. By 2030, over half of the plastic in the EU will be recycled, and all packaging plastics will either be easily recyclable or reusable.
Here in the UK, a number of other single-use plastics will be banned from sale from October 2023, as part of the government’s drive to reduce pollution and environmental damage caused by single-use plastics.
It’s time to invest in reusable drink bottles
For some, bringing a refillable drinks bottle when traveling is already as normal as bringing a phone or a travel bag and with initiatives like we are seeing at Schiphol airport, it’s inevitable this trend will continue to grow.
Whilst all of the above is fantastic for the environment, it also presents a great opportunity for marketers and companies to produce high quality reusable drinkware for their staff and customers. Reusable drink bottles and coffee cups are already extremely popular, well received promotional gift items and the more that single-use alternatives are removed from sale, the more popular and useful they will become.
If you’re looking to invest in branded reusable drink bottles or coffee cups, contact our team on sales@brandelity.com with your requirements. Alternatively, use the button below to view our bestselling options.
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