Circular Economy

Reuse and Circularity Pilots Taking Off Inside Major Sports, Entertainment Venues

Beverage giants Coca-Cola and PepsiCo are among companies working with partners to swap out single-use cups and trays for reusable serveware systems at big events.

By Geoff Nudelman | Published 4 months ago | About a 4 minute read

Image: r.World

When PepsiCo and Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) came together to implement circular reuse systems for cups and trays at last year’s Champions League Finals in Europe, it was a promising first step in putting a dent in the immense amount of plastic waste produced at major sporting events.

The Champions League Finals, which feature the top two European men’s and women’s soccer teams in respective matches, are held in massive stadiums with tens of thousands in attendance. The reuse pilots built on seemingly smaller projects from the year prior, which focused on bottles primarily made of recycled plastic.

More consumer-facing companies are beginning to understand the undeniable business case for shifting from disposables to reusables in various contexts, and food and beverage service is an area with incredible potential for impact. Earlier this month, a first-of-its-kind, citywide reuse system for beverage cups was launched in Petaluma, Calif. — backed by brands including Starbucks, The Coca-Cola Company, PepsiCo, Peet’s Coffee and Yum! Brands — with a goal of creating an operationally viable model for scale. In the meantime, these kinds of pilots are becoming increasingly common at large event venues — as the beverage and entertainment industries work together to reduce overall waste output during major events.

“The momentum is phenomenal,” Tina Swanson, Chief Revenue Officer at R.world — a startup that supplies reusable serveware and manages the entire cleaning and return process — told Sustainable Brands® (SB).

R.world’s R.cup system is the foundation of a partnership with Coca-Cola to trial the product across several of the beverage giant’s sports properties and relationships in North America.

R.cups had already launched in Los Angeles’ Crypto.com Arena, and Swanson reported a 98 percent return rate for those using the cups. While the initial pilot focused only on suite-level use, she says there are plans to roll out the partnership to all seats in the arena.

Although Coca-Cola did not provide any further detail about the partnership, Swanson did say the beverage company aims to roll out r.World products “in all branches of their business.” What remains unclear is if this will expand into Coca-Cola’s upcoming, marquee sports events: the Paris 2024 Olympics and FIFA World Cup 26 across the US, Canada and Mexico in 2026.

These pilots can also be a channel for both beverage companies and sports properties to take another step towards meeting lofty “zero-waste” goals. UEFA and PepsiCo have a joint goal of reaching “zero waste to landfill” by 2026 at the Champions League Finals. UEFA Social and Environmental Sustainability Director Michele Uva wouldn’t comment when asked about progress toward the 2026 goal, but PepsiCo told SB that the TURN system eliminated the use of more than 70,000 single-use plastic cups at the 2023 Men’s Final in Istanbul; and at the Women’s Final in Eindhoven, Netherlands, a similar program led to a 90 percent return rate for cups and 60 percent for trays.

The Women’s Final was the first to pilot a returnable packaging program — where 52,000, 40-centiliter cups were available to purchase for a returnable deposit of €2; and Doritos Nachos were served in returnable trays throughout the stadium. The Men’s Final deployed 48,000 TURN smart cups, which were scanned at the collection point and could be sanitized and reused through the company’s second-use system.

Stateside, an example of a reuse pilot turning into more permanent action is happening in Portland, Ore. at the city’s Moda Center arena. The facility’s main tenant, the NBA’s Portland Trail Blazers, worked with reusable cup supplier Bold Reuse to implement a similar trial run to Coca-Cola and r.World’s — starting in the suite and club levels, then expanding across the arena’s 20,500 seats.

“It created a lot of momentum with reuse in the sports and entertainment space,” Brittany Saulsbury, the team’s Sustainability Operations Manager, told SB.

The 2023-2024 season was the first for a full stadium rollout; and the team reported a 73 percent return rate across 75 events, eliminating the need for more than 400,000 cups and the infrastructure to dispose of them. The system is fairly integrated, as used cups are sorted and hauled away for sanitizing offsite and returned for the next use. The proof of concept has led to other sports teams — including the National Women’s Soccer League’s Kansas City Current — taking note and working to implement their own reuse systems.

For now, larger sports and entertainment facilities will likely see higher ROI from reuse systems as they can provide the cups and infrastructure at scale at a better value. That’s where most of the initial growth is likely to happen in this space until the systems are refined and efficient enough to make sense for smaller organizations.

Geoff Nudelman

Geoff is a freelance journalist and copywriter focused on making the world a better place through compelling copy. He covers everything from apparel to travel while helping brands worldwide craft their messaging. In addition to Sustainable Brands, he's currently a contributor at Penta, AskMen.com, Field Mag and many others. You can check out more of his work at geoffnudelman.com.

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