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Take your mug to work and help save the environment

Photo by Daniel Woodrum

Bringing your own mug to work is not just good for the environment, it's also good for your company's bottom line.

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By JENNIFER HILL | News Channel 8

Published: October 14, 2009

Aahh the sweet sound of brewing coffee to keep us moving at the office.

And we love our coffee.

Tampa was recently voted the most caffeinated city in America.

But before you reach for that disposable cup think about this: All those cups we throw away are adding up.

To the tune of 23 pounds of trash per person, according to Christine Commerce of Keep Hillsborough County Beautiful, which is an affiliate of Keep America Beautiful.

We are generating "28 million cups or 100 million pounds of paper that ends up in our landfills each year," said Commerce. That's 23 pounds of garbage per person. While some people recycle, 67 percent of people surveyed said they threw their cups in the trash not the recycle bin.

Commerce's non-profit organization works to reduce waster and litter and beautify the community.

One way is a litter clean up, where Commerce's says she often sees cups that didn't land in the trash or the recycler but in the streets or our area's water ways.

That's why the organization is pushing a local version of "Bring Your Mug to Work Day, sponsored nationwide by International Delight.

As photographer Jay Nolan and I shot this story around our office, the News Center, we noticed that mugs are a fun way for people to express themselves. Some people have their kid's faces on them, others are ones that were banned from the house because they don't match the rest of the china. Others we found have been with their owners since college.

Bringing your own mug to work is not just good for the environment, it's also good for your company's bottom line.

Each mug you use is one less cup to buy.

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