BCGDV Social Ventures Program Part I: Introducing RECUP — One Reusable Container at a Time
How BCG Digital Ventures is working with RECUP to end disposable containers
The BCG Digital Ventures Social Ventures Program is a dedicated sprint offered free-of-charge to promising companies with a social mission.
For the inaugural round of the program, we worked with Plan A, helping to bring their online emissions tracking and analysis platform to the next level. You can read more about the work we did with Plan A here.
Towards the end of 2020, we opened up applications for the second round of the program. This time, the chosen company would operate remotely, but still receive guidance, support, and input from a dedicated team of DVers.
There was, as was the case for the first round, enthusiastic uptake from a wide range of socially-minded companies, with more than 60 initiatives entering the application process. From there, the DV Social Impact Committee whittled down the list to the 15 applicants with the most promising offerings, and then to five finalists. These finalists competed in a pitch event, and two were chosen.
The first winner to undertake a dedicated sprint and receive the support of DV is RECUP. We’ll be following their progress along the way, so stay tuned for more updates here and on our social media channels. In this installment, we’ll introduce RECUP and outline some of the work the joint RECUP and DV team will be doing over the next few weeks.
German consumers use 2.8 billion disposable cups per year for hot beverages, equivalent to 23 cups per person. That’s far from an ideal situation: Plastic lids and plastic coated cups cause emissions when produced only to be thrown away or end up as litter on the streets. It’s also an avoidable problem — using a reusable cup should be an easy enough solution, one of the no-brainer environmental fixes we need to make in order to cut emissions. But coffee shops and cafes still distribute disposable cups; the problem is still there, and it’s been exacerbated by the pandemic. According to the Der Grüne Punkt, packaging waste in private households has increased by 10% since spring 2020 because more food and beverages are being ordered and consumed ‘to-go’.
RECUP is working to solve this problem. Taking advantage of Germany’s ‘pfand’ system, where it’s common practice to pay a small deposit for a glass or bottle and be reimbursed once it’s returned for recycling or reuse, RECUP distributes its own reusable cups to cafes and restaurants around Germany, encouraging customers to avoid using disposables.
Launched in 2016, RECUP now has 6000 partner locations around Germany and continues to grow, taking more than 35 000 pre-orders of its new bowl offering in January 2021 alone.
So why did RECUP want to work with DV? “We’re pretty much an offline business at the moment, we’re proud that our deposit network works 100% offline,” explains RECUP CPO Benjamin Harr. “We’ve been able to beautifully scale our simple deposit system. However, looking to the future we see the market requirement to add digital services to our portfolio. We knew DV could accelerate our efforts.”
On the DV side, the team was enthused by RECUP’s strong offering and their success so far, and excited to see how digital could play a part. “I think the fact that RECUP has a strong product already out there in operation and a value proposition that works made it the perfect candidate for us to work with,” said Philipp Schrader, who is the GM of the sprint from the DV side. “There are no roadblocks in terms of ‘how do we change this business model?’ We can really hit the ground running with gradual, effective improvements on the digital side.”
The collaboration comes at a key time for RECUP. In January 2021, just as the sprint was about to start, the German government passed the Verpackungsgesetz legislation, which mandates cafes and restaurants to provide a reusable option for customers by the beginning of 2023. This is a fantastic opportunity for RECUP, and the team anticipates increased demand for their offering in the wake of the need for businesses to comply.
Enhancing RECUP’s digital offering will be an important part of this. Right now, customers can see where RECUP containers are available digitally, but not much more. During the sprint with DV, digital transactions and reimbursement through the RECUP app will be implemented, meaning customers will have the additional option of making a cashless deposit. This is particularly relevant given the increase in cashless payment during the COVID-19 pandemic, but the potential doesn’t end there.
“A bowl from RECUP, REBOWL, currently requires a €5 deposit. If you’re with a group of friends, maybe that means you have to hand over a €20 note,” explains Benjamin. “With a cashless transaction that will be reimbursed through our app, we are offering an optional workaround. In the longer term, that gives us the possibility to widen our product portfolio in order to become the one-stop shop for reusables.”
Additionally, a digital offering will allow RECUP to become more quantitative, able to measure each RECUP transaction to see what’s in demand and what can be improved. Building out this digital product is a process DV is supporting with too. “Digital transactions are great, but we’re also thinking about how we might enable users to track their sustainability footprint to encourage better behavior or use, for example,” says Philipp. “The digital transaction process works with simple QR code technology, which keeps track of the cup and enables users to keep track of their footprint, as well as receive other behavioural nudges to encourage more sustainable behavior. We’re building a prototype for testing and validating features with frequent RECUP users and partners, and we’re closely cooperating with them to inform the conceptual direction.”
The collaboration is still in the early stages, but both RECUP and DV are excited to see the progress and the impact RECUP will have once a full digital offering is in place.
