Absolutely genius! If every traditional disposable coffee cup was replaced with these, can you imagine the impact that would have on our planet? Wow!

There is no denying that the world is wasting billions of dollars on food, throwing out un-recycled trash, and filling landfills with other odds and ends. Coffee cups, being one of the most littered and non recycled items of them all.

Millions upon millions of coffee cups are used daily and many of them end up in landfills and far too many end up on the side of the road, in the woods and littered all over the place. Not cool, we know! Luckily, there is a new coffee cup on the market and it’s design is absolutely brilliant.

A California-based business called Reduce. Reuse. Grow. partnered with designer Alex Henige to create a biodegradable coffee cup embedded with planting seeds, and a local map of the best places to plant the cup when you are done drinking.

How does it work?

In America more than 146 billion cups have been discarded annually from drinking coffee. Even when the cups are being recycled, the paper products “can only be reused two to three times before the fibers are unusable and discarded into local landfills without consumers knowing.”

This brilliant idea that Henige came up with is simple and can be a pleasant experience for the consumer. Not only that, but it will help the environment as well! Here’s how it works:

1. The customer buys the coffee, drinks the beverage, then either dumps the cup in a marked bin at the restaurant or takes the cup home.
2. Simply unravel the cup. Planting zone are found on the cup itself and planting instructions on the bottom of the cup.
3. Soak the unraveled cup in water for about five minutes.
4. Plant!

Even if the cups are littered on the ground and find their way to soil…the natural elements will break down the cup and the seeds will embed in the soil and grow. (This doesn’t mean you should be tossing these cups out of your car window however).

Some may wonder if the heat of the coffee itself can harm the seeds. “We have done testing with a handful of native seeds here in California as related to coffee heat. We have had no problem with their germination due to the fact that they are not coming in direct contact with the coffee itself,” explains Henige. “The liner as well as the paper absorbs a lot of the heat allowing the seeds to not be effected directly.”