McDonald’s Canada on mission to reduce waste with Green Concept Restaurants

McDonald’s Canada is setting out to make packaging more sustainable as part of its goal to reduce its environmental footprint and source 100 per cent of guest packaging from renewable and/or recycled materials.

McDonald’s will unveil two “Green Concept Restaurants” in London, Ont. and Vancouver, B.C. These restaurants will act as incubator locations to test new packaging options and recycling initiatives.

The Green Concept Restaurants will continue using much of the current McDonald’s packaging but will also test items with the potential to be rolled out more widely in the future. The first innovations will begin testing in the coming months and include:

• A fully repulpable cup for cold beverages – a Canadian QSR first
  • The cup uses an aqueous coating that is acceptable in recycling streams
  • A medium size cup will be tested
• New fibre lids – a Canadian QSR first
  • Product is made from 100 per cent Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified wood fibre and is recyclable
  • The lid will also help reduce straw use, as guests can sip from it directly
  • Lids will be tested on all three cold cup sizes
• Wooden cutlery
• Wooden stir sticks
• Paper straws

Globally, McDonald’s has been on a journey to offer sustainable packaging and reduce waste overall. These immediate enhancements, along with changes made over recent years, will remove more than 1,500 tons of packaging materials from the McDonald’s Canada system by:

• Napkins: Introducing a smaller napkin (20 per cent smaller) produced with 100 per cent recycled fibre in all restaurants, which eliminates more than 900 tons of paper.
• McWrap® carton: Transitioning from a McWrap carton to a McWrap wrap will eliminate more than 400 tons of packaging.
• Foam: Eliminated foam from the gravy bowl and breakfast platter, removing more than 130 tons of foam.
• Small Coffee Cup: The light-weighting of the small hot cup – removing the paper from the outer layer of the cup – eliminated more than 123 tons of paper.
• Added a How 2 Recycle (H2R) label to Happy Meal® boxes, clear cups and carryout bags to help guests determine how packaging can be recycled.