{"id":32688,"date":"2022-11-04T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-11-04T11:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/freshcup.com\/?p=32688"},"modified":"2022-11-03T17:43:57","modified_gmt":"2022-11-03T22:43:57","slug":"beyond-wish-cycling-kin-coffee-aims-for-a-zero-waste-future","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/freshcup.com\/beyond-wish-cycling-kin-coffee-aims-for-a-zero-waste-future\/","title":{"rendered":"Beyond \u201cWish-Cycling\u201d: Kin Coffee Aims for a Zero-Waste Future"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Founded at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Kin Coffee in rural Kent, UK, is a small coffee roaster tackling the challenges of creating and running a sustainable business. Started in a repurposed shed in a family member\u2019s backyard, Kin was named by  The Times<\/a> (London) as one of five game-changing coffee brands in the UK to watch in October 2021 for offering whole bean and ground coffee in reusable glass containers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the path to sustainability is filled with trial and error, admit founders Gregory Salmon and Kate Frost. It took \u201cextensive research and being a bit bullheaded,\u201d says Salmon. While some solutions are simple\u2014shredding used cardboard to repurpose as packaging for products during shipping or making bags, pillows, and seat covers from old burlap bags\u2014some problems, like sourcing environmentally-friendly packaging, are not quite as easy to solve. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cracking The Packaging Problem<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

As they prepared to sell their coffee at local farmer\u2019s markets, the duo knew using recyclable packaging was non-negotiable. \u201cWe started buying \u2018fully recyclable\u2019 plastic pouches but discovered they were level 4 recycling (low-density polyethylene, or LDPE), which is the type you have to take to a specialist facility,\u201d says Salmon. This led to a lot of \u201cwish-cycling,\u201d according to Salmon; many of their customers assumed bags were fully recyclable because of the symbol on the bag, so they tossed them into their home recycling bins, unaware of the specialized treatment these products require. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Wish-cycling, or the practice of recycling items that cannot be recycled, is a global problem. According to UK-based WRAP<\/a> (The Waste and Resources Action Programme), in a 2021 survey<\/a>, 85% of UK households put one or more items into their recycling that they assume are recyclable. In 2019<\/a>, 25% of US households did the same. Wish-cycling non-recyclable things lead to contamination at recycling plants, often resulting in recycling loads being dumped in landfills. According to climate scientists<\/a>, improper recycling is becoming a global crisis and is dramatically impacting greenhouse gas emissions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With this in mind, Salmon and Frost knew they couldn\u2019t settle on the coffee bags they started with. After extensive research, and aided by Frost\u2019s knowledge from having worked in a glassware import business, they settled on milk-bottle-style glass jars that can be recycled or reused. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the glass bottles weren\u2019t a perfect solution. \u201cThe key problem with glass is it\u2019s really difficult to get anything with a valve,\u201d says Salmon. \u201cAnd we didn\u2019t want any glass bottles exploding on retail shelves,\u201d Frost says, noting that freshly-roasted coffee degasses over time and a one-way valve is necessary to prevent pressure from building up inside the glass. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Frost says that the first valves they purchased were a mistake: thick plastic stick-on valves affixed to the jar\u2019s metal lids that weren\u2019t recyclable at home. The valves were also labor-intensive for the duo: they had to punch a hole in each top, then affix the valve with a food-safe glue. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But frustration leads to change. \u201cWe knew there were these sticker valves we wanted, but you had to order 78,000 at a minimum,\u201d says Frost. \u201cBut we were very persistent\u201d and kept asking for samples to see if they would work. When they finally received them, \u201cthat was the game changer.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The new valves, Flexis\u2122 One-Way Coffee Valves<\/a>, use 90% less plastic than the standard hard valve and are very thin, with a three-layer secure seal. Now fully recyclable, the whole container is also reusable, with some of their customers reporting they use them for at-home food fermentation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Search For Better Packaging<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Kin still needed a small, lightweight pouch for their monthly subscription service, where they ship customers coffee through the mail. They found a biodegradable pouch, which was less expensive to mail than a glass jar, allowing customers to pour the ground coffee or beans from the pouch into their Kin coffee jar. The plastic pouch they initially settled on is home-compostable and made from cellulose derived from renewable wood pulp. But this environmentally-friendly option still had drawbacks. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The compostable bags take about six weeks to break down. The decomposition rate is slower in the winter, while the summer heat causes the bags to get oily, and decomposition happens more quickly. Additionally, if the bags get wet, the packaging will break down, which is a big problem if there\u2019s still coffee in the bags\u2014it needs to be decanted immediately. But, as Frost and Salmon note, if the bags end up in a landfill, they\u2019re not putting more plastic into the ground. Salmon states that eliminating that bit of plastic is \u201cthe key takeaway: it\u2019s the best we can do at the moment.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since our initial interview with Kin, they have moved to another solution for mail-order customers and farmer\u2019s market purchasers: paper pouches, a change made after their search for larger paper pouches for their wholesale clients. They started searching for a paper bag with a compostable valve to use at wholesale, while finding that the same valve issue exists for paper coffee bags as for the glass jars: finding a degassing valve that the end user can recycle proved problematic here as well. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Frost stresses they\u2019ve approached each new challenge \u201cone problem at a time\u201d while continually searching for better eco-friendly products that come into the market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Through The Bag Broker UK<\/a>, Kin found the paper coffee bags they now use for retail and larger bags for wholesale. The bags, made from compostable kraft paper, wood pulp, and sugarcane sealant film, are made with non-fossil fuels and are fully compostable at home and with industrial food waste (though not recyclable). \u201cThey\u2019re the only place in the world that does them,\u201d says Salmon, \u201cas far as I\u2019m aware.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Packaging For The Future<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

What do Frost and Salmon envision for the future of Kin? They\u2019ve just moved operations out of the garden shed into a coffee shop with a roasting facility. They will continue their eco efforts while keeping an eye on changes in the industry. They plan to start recycling coffee grounds into coffee bricks through a company like Bio-bean<\/a> and are investigating purchasing a larger, more environmentally friendly roaster\u2014but they\u2019re taking things one step at a time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They\u2019re seeing a lot of movement in packaging options, including compostable and recyclable plant-derived bags. \u201cWe\u2019re not alone in what we\u2019re feeling,\u201d says Frost. \u201cThere\u2019s definitely been a movement to get coffee bags into something that, for the end user, is easily recycled and composted. You start from the beginning, make those small steps, and everything adds up.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The duo will continue to set high standards for Kin. \u201cWe\u2019re almost at the point of being zero waste,\u201d says Salmon. They compost all of their chaff, recycle all cardboard, use spare burlap coffee bean bags in the garden to plant things like tomatoes, and even sell them to people wanting to use them for sack races at home. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs long as you\u2019ve got a clear guiding light of what you\u2019re after,\u201d says Salmon, \u201cyou\u2019ll find the solution.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kin Coffee in Kent, UK, is tackling sustainability one problem at a time, determined to find viable and innovative solutions and unafraid to reassess along the way. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1693,"featured_media":32691,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"limit_modified_date":"","last_modified_date":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}},"beyondwords_generate_audio":"","beyondwords_project_id":"","beyondwords_content_id":"","beyondwords_player_style":"","beyondwords_language_id":"","beyondwords_title_voice_id":"","beyondwords_body_voice_id":"","beyondwords_summary_voice_id":"","beyondwords_error_message":"","beyondwords_disabled":"","beyondwords_podcast_id":"","beyondwords_hash":"","publish_post_to_speechkit":"","speechkit_hash":"","speechkit_generate_audio":"","speechkit_project_id":"","speechkit_podcast_id":"","speechkit_error_message":"","speechkit_disabled":"","speechkit_access_key":"","speechkit_error":"","speechkit_info":"","speechkit_response":"","speechkit_retries":"","speechkit_updated_at":"","_speechkit_link":"","_speechkit_text":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nBeyond \u201cWish-Cycling\u201d: Kin Coffee Aims for a Zero-Waste Future - 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