Meet Melissa Seeley | Co-Founder | Good To Go Cups

We had the good fortune of connecting with Melissa Seeley and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Melissa, is your business focused on helping the community? If so, how?
Good To Go Cups aims to displace the waste of single-use cups. 2.5 billion single-use coffee cups are discarded globally every year with the majority ending up in landfills. In our attempt to address this waste we created a reusable, recyclable and ultimately compostable to-go coffee cup used in a cup exchange program at participating coffee shops.

Our Good To Go Cups are made to be reused and reused and reused. Customers purchase a membership through our app allowing their drinks to be served in a Good To Go Cup versus a single-use cup. Once a drink is finished, simply return the cup to a participating coffee shop. When you are ready for your next drink, that beverage will be served in a clean reusable cup. Cup usage will be tracked through the app so you’ll always know how many single-use cups you’ve saved from the landfill! At the end of the cup’s life it will be collected and returned to the manufacturer where the majority will be used to create new cups and the rest will be composted.

Good To Go Cups makes it easy for communities to incorporate sustainability into their coffee purchases. Our partner coffee shops save money on single-use cup purchases and waste hauling fees. Our customers have a convenient option for a reusable to-go cup. Our cup and exchange program conserve resources, decrease waste and make sustainability an easy option for everyone.

What should our readers know about your business?

Good To Go Cups was started by two women with a passion for environmental sustainability. We have 14 years of experience working in sustainability from starting an organics program in a school district to working with local government on a variety of environmental initiatives. We also have years of experience in sales, marketing and finance from our former careers.

We both love coffee and abhor the amount of single-use coffee cups that seem to be present wherever we look; that fill up the trash cans and cannot be recycled or composted. We talked many times about tackling the problem in which we participated.

We immersed ourselves in circular economy research and realized that the next stage of sustainability is reuse. All data suggests we cannot recycle our way out of our current waste situation. We are on the forefront of a paradigm shift into the circular economy where reuse is key. Recognizing that reuse is so fundamental to our future sustainability, we chose one small area to address that we hope will have a big impact.

We carefully created our own unique reusable cup. We examined existing reusable cup options and found problems with each. Which led us to a manufacturer who has access to an innovative compostable polymer. This allows us to create a reusable and ultimately compostable to-go coffee cup. Keeping our footprint as small as possible, while solving a large waste problem.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?

After spending years advocating for recycling and composting it was after taking a course from the Ellen MacArthur Foundation that really opened our eyes to the importance of reuse and the circular economy. Reuse is a better option than single-use in all forms regardless of whether it’s recyclable or compostable.

The community of people working across the globe on innovative sustainability solutions inspire us every day!

Website: www.goodtogocups.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/goodtogocups/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/good-to-go-cups/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100085211307024

Other: Our app can be found on the App store or Google Play under Good To Go Cups

Image Credits
Caitlin Simmons shot the first image Michelle Horan shot the rest