What’s the alternative to plastic straws? There was a push in many US cities to get rid of them but they switched to paper straws where the vast majority of them were possibly worse for the environment, and even if not, the benefits were not significant.
Personally I carry my own metal straw around (especially for hot drinks…I’ve never understood people who drink hot drinks with plastic straws and I’d suspect whatever keeps a paper straw from not collapsing with hot drinks is likely to be something I don’t want in my system either) but am not sure if that’s a scalable solution? Is that what Europeans do?
Alternatively, of course, you just don’t use straws. Glasses exist…
This is what I do. Not sure why straws are so popular. I heard restaurants pushed them because it made people drink more/faster, but most places have free refills these days so that doesn't really make sense anymore.
It's kinda hard to drink a soft drink with ice cubes without a straw. Get rid of the ice cubes, and you don't need a straw anymore. Or you could use a (paper!) lid similar to that on coffee-to-go cups.
I can’t recall the last US restaurant that didn’t have free drink refills. Why would they want to push people to consume something they refill for free faster? Is it possible people just like straws?
There was a time when drink refills were not free, you had to pay for another drink. The arugment was, they gave you straws so you would drink more and buy larger or more drinks.
At some point restaurants realized they could offer free refills as a competitive advantage, (or save labor and have customers fill their own drinks) and now everyone does it. At that point, straws were just something that was expected.
Can you prove this at all? I’m seeing White Castle offered free refills in the early 60s and plastic drinking straws didn’t become popular until the same time period.
I worked at McDonald's for several years in the 1980s, they did not do free drink refills (coffee excepted) at that time. As I recall, most other restaurants did the same.
Yeah, I just don't use straws, except for the copper tube someone gave me, which I only use once or twice a week when I'm chatting with friends using a headset that would get bumped when sipping warm water. I mostly drink water, and am not concerned about spilling in the car.
Now that I eat more fiber, from sprouted legumes, fresh fruits and vegetables, and microwaved-in-a-little-water root vegetables, I find I can go a lot longer without drinking water.
What percentage of people drink who drink beer or wine drink it with a straw?
What percentage of people who drink sugary beverages use straws, and why the difference?
Personally I carry my own metal straw around (especially for hot drinks…I’ve never understood people who drink hot drinks with plastic straws and I’d suspect whatever keeps a paper straw from not collapsing with hot drinks is likely to be something I don’t want in my system either) but am not sure if that’s a scalable solution? Is that what Europeans do?
Alternatively, of course, you just don’t use straws. Glasses exist…