CASA GRANDE — McDonald’s customers drink a lot of coffee. Each day the restaurants each produce about 29.5 pounds of coffee ground waste — about 11,000 per year.
But a new program by Arizona McDonald’s, McCafé School Garden Grow!, aims to divert used coffee grounds from landfills and recycle them for use in school gardens.
Casa Grande’s McCartney Ranch and Ironwood elementary schools and Cactus and Casa Grande middle schools have already signed up to participate in the program, according to a press release from Arizona McDonald’s.
They’re among the 100 schools statewide to have signed up and are currently using the restaurant’s used coffee grounds in their gardens and composts, said Casa Grande McDonald’s owner Robert Souza.
The new initiative is part of McDonald’s “Good Neighbor Good Grounds” recycling program, designed to divert used coffee grounds from the waste stream by promoting their reuse to add nutrients to soil or compost.
Schools pick up the grounds weekly from their local McDonald’s restaurant.
“McCartney Ranch Elementary is excited to be a part of McDonald’s coffee grounds recycling program to help our garden beds grow,” Amy Cameron, a McCartney Ranch teacher, said in a press release. “We are looking forward to a bountiful collaboration with McDonald’s and teaching students the importance of recycling and reuse.”
Arizona restaurants participating in the recycling program expect to divert thousands of pounds of coffee grounds from going into the waste stream, according to Souza.
A recent waste assessment audit by Waste Management, a McDonald’s restaurant has 29.5 pounds of coffee grounds waste each day or 11,000 pounds a year, according to the press release.
“Our McDonald’s restaurants serve a lot of coffee,” Souza said in the release. “The opportunity to partner with schools in our communities to reduce our coffee grounds waste is a win for everyone.”
Restaurant officials said they hope to expand the program in the spring and by making used coffee grounds available to the community for local gardens and composts.
“Concern for the environment is important to us as well as our customers,” Souza said.
The restaurants practice responsible coffee sourcing with the majority purchased from Rainforest Alliance Certified farms, including the company’s espresso.
“Our restaurants work hard to reuse, reduce and recycle,” Souza said. “We also currently recycle used cooking oil in nearly all of our restaurants. Our napkins are made out of 100 percent recycled content and we are the first in the industry to have the ‘How2Recycle’ label on many of our recyclable packages, bags and clear cups. We’ve also set a time-bound goal to achieve 100 percent of our packaging from certified or recycled sources by the year 2020.”
Schools or community gardens interested in participating in the coffee grounds recycling program may call Rhonda Grundemann at 602-739-8810 to be assigned to a local McDonald’s restaurant.
The 300 McDonald’s restaurants in Arizona annually feed $283.6 million into the Arizona economy and employ 13,853 people.
