Waitrose is offering shoppers the option to “borrow” a returnable coffee cup in order to redeem their free coffee when shopping, in a new loyalty perk trial.
The supermarket installed the “circular” system, which has been developed by Cornish company Circular&Co, into nine of its stores earlier this week, The Grocer understands. It includes its store in Newark, which was spotted by founder of the Meals Collective Olly Pinder, who first highlighted the new trial.
Billed as ‘Borrow a Free Cup’, shoppers can access a cup from a dispenser in store by tapping their card. They can then fill the cup from Waitrose’s hot drinks machines as usual. They have seven days to return the cup to a designated collection point in store, or will be charged £3 if they fail to do so.
The Grocer understands Waitrose is testing the concept as part of its ongoing work to enhance its loyalty scheme.
“We’re currently conducting a reusable cup trial in nine of our branches – it kicked off this week and is available for MyWaitrose members to use when redeeming their free coffee, or for our café customers to use if purchasing one.”
It’s the latest change to Waitrose’s free hot drink offer, since the retailer returned the immensely popular perk to its MyWaitrose loyalty scheme in October 2022, having scrapped the benefit during Covid-19 in order to save costs.
Waitrose now once again recognises the perk as a lynchpin of its loyalty programme, and is elevating the offer ahead of the delayed, but still ongoing, relaunch of its pan-partnership loyalty scheme.
Last August, Waitrose introduced recyclable disposable coffee cups to 10 of its stores, in a 12-week trial. It originally removed disposable cups from all of its stores in 2018 in an effort to reduce packaging waste.
The Grocer understands that Waitrose is still considering whether to make recyclable cups permanent, alongside other options, in order to increase choice for shoppers.
The latest trial is set to run for the next few months. Pinder, a former Co-op head of buying who is an expert in food to go and meal solutions, welcomed the move.
“This is spectacular,” he said. “So easy to use and return. It meant I could redeem my free coffee.”
No comments yet