All Bar One to phase out plastic straws

The company has pledged to end the use of plastic straws in its bars nationwide, and is calling on other bars and businesses to stop using them.

The campaign will see all plastic straws phased out at All Bar One sites over the next three weeks, by either removing them totally from drinks, or replacing them with biodegradable substitutes by Vegware - which makes its straws from plants and is the only completely compostable packaging company operating globally.

Reduce single-use plastic​

The group said it currently serves straws in 25% of its drinks and uses an average of 1,600 straws a week per bar – equating to around 13,000 a day as a brand.

All Bar One assistant marketing manager Kate Dell said: “We are committed to reducing our impact on the environment and one of the ways we are doing this is drastically reducing our consumption of single-use plastics, like straws.

“Our straw promise marks our long-term commitment to minimising our usage of straws in bars as much as possible.”

Dell said the group will no longer be automatically offering straws with drinks, and will be supplying guests with greener alternative where required.

“We are sure our guests will support us in this initiative and will be happy to enjoy their drinks straw-free,” she said.

Straws suck​

Oakman Inns launched its own permanent ‘ban the straw’ campaign on Earth Day​ (22 April) declaring “straws suck”, which was also turned into a hashtag on Twitter.

At the time, Oakman Inns said the decision to end the use of plastic straws was made because the company had become concerned it was using more than 100,000 plastic straws a month across its 17-strong group.