An investigation into consumer behaviour towards disposable coffee cups purchased through Hospitality establishments

Abstract

Due to consumers’ affection for on-the-go consumption disposable coffee cups have become an essential part of modern life. The implications of the pandemic forced the industry into a special position, where there is a need to drive sustainable practices in order to regain economic momentum. There has been growing consumer awareness about the negative environmental effects of disposable coffee cups, hence the aim of this dissertation is to investigate consumer behaviour towards disposable coffee cups purchased through hospitality businesses. A quantitative research approach was used to obtain a holistic overview of the topic. A questionnaire was issued online, and it received 94 responses regarding cup use and ways of disposal. Questions were based on established key themes and they were mostly close ended. However, they involved open-ended questions, which enabled participants to further specify their views on few different issues. Descriptive analysis was utilised to interpret primary data and a deductive approach was applied at each layer of data collection. Findings revealed that disposable coffee cup purchasing is impulsive and that consumers purchased them as they are the easiest option. Statistics indicated that younger generations used more disposable coffee cups, while the older generations gravitated towards reusable cups. The researcher recommends that the best measure to reduce the environmental impact of disposable coffee cups is to gradually eliminate them completely. By ensuring cooperation between the government, non-government organisations such as Zero Waste Scotland and other hospitality businesses, they should strive to offer better alternatives such as bio paper cups. Further, more regulations regarding disposable cup manufacturers are needed as they often use misleading recycling labels on their cups, which results in inappropriately disposal within consumers.