Doesn't smell up car? That takes a nice aspect of it away...just give'em to me in the silver bags.

Also, act kind of "uneducated" but interested about the different kinds of coffees and it's a good chance you'll get a free cup of one kind or another! :)

Ed

Er, honestly I don't worry about leaking bags of UCGs...when I go on a Starbucks run I've got a 30-gallon garbage can in the back of the jeep. :)

Ed

how many stops for 30 gal?
btw, I use all those "free" bags to hold my shredded news paper and soon for leaves. Seldom have to buy garbage can liners.

I cut the bags open and use them to cover the piles after a good rain. My husband doesn't approve of watering compost. It also helps keep the acorns and hickory nuts out of the half done or finished compost.

I take some of the old bags with me. If the grounds are leaking at Starbucks, I ask for another bag. They are happy to drop the leaking bag into a new bag. It saves them cleanup as you walk out of the store! If they are leaking after I leave, I put them in an old bag.
FYI-
I go to Starbucks adjoining a market. I leave a grocery cart outside when I go in to get "grounds for my garden." I walk out and put them in the grocery cart to lighten the load!

A new Starbucks recently near the Wal-Mart/Sams Club I visit weekly.

I was getting 5-10 silver bags for a while, but somebody else has since discovered the treasure. Now I usually have to ask if there are any grounds behind the counter.

I'm not upset by this turn of events. I was actually getting too many grounds to use for a while, but I kept taking them because I wanted to make sure they kept saving them. Also as it cools off, my wife's objections to spreading the grounds on the grass also abate.

I ended up buying a plastic bin for transporting the grounds, because I've found that no matter how well the grounds are bagged, they can still leak. If I luck out and my "competitor" didn't get there, I fill a bin and put the rest (double or triple bagged) on the lid.

i have yet to score 10gal. Probably too high of starbuck concentration, dunkin & petes. I thought near a college would be good, but it seems the prices are too high for students or they drink tea (maybe if free wifi were offered). I couldnt find a way to check store data on sales. Anyone know an insider in accounting? All I know is that I am going to need a lot of coffee when the leaves fall.

Oh no, I don't score 30 pounds at a time. I just ended up one day having the 30 gallon can in the back of the jeep...hmm, not something bad to have in the jeep if I don't need the room for hauling something else. Thus, with the can I've got a container for "whatever" might come my way and being as the nearest Starbucks is about 60-70 miles from me I want to be prepared when the opportunity arises!!! :)

Ed

Anybody tried waffle house? all of those coffee grounds AND lovely eggshells...Any ideas on their corporate policy?

"This is a copy of my message of July ??. A gold star for Starbucks in case many of you have not read this message before". Here it is again. As of Oct 1 I am still getting free coffee for removng the used coffee grounds. Please all of you stay out of Deleware Starbucks. I got a real good thing going here, dont need no help.. Here is my thread of July". If you search for edgman you can see the original.

"I was in Home Depot the other day and I saw a Starbucks across the way. I went in to get a coffee but before I ordered I asked the young lady who was waiting on me if they had any coffee grounds left over that I could have for my compost bin. Never did this before. The next thing I know she called the manager over. I thought they were going to arrest me for being a terrorist because I had just bought some gypsum and maybe adding coffee grounds would make an atomic bomb. The manager politely asked me what they were for and I told him for my compost bin. He told me that it would take a few minutes to get them together and would I like a free coffee while waiting. While I was drinking my free coffee the young lady asked me if I would like a free donut. About this time I was ready to leave my wife and move into Starbucks. I got about 20 pounds of free coffee grounds and the manager says to me on the way out, "Thanks for recycling, please stop in again". You better believe I will stop in again. I think we ought to add Starbucks to our good list. I had tried this at Dunkin Donuts but they told me it was too much trouble to save grounds. And no I will not tell no one where this Starbucks is located at. This one is mine alone. The coffee was great. Always tastes better when its free.
edgman

my NEW one just recently told me that they aren't saving them anymore because 'no one gardens in the winter.'
UCHHH!!! The nerve!

Even though I have stopped in a couple times in the past couple weeks.

Guess it's time to write a letter and be more 'regular' in my UCG pick-ups. (I like to just stop in 'whenever' and have them available. Not that they serve ONLY coffee there, and they ALWAYS have UCGs in the garbage under the counter...they won't just pull the bag of grounds & filters out for me.)

Ok, off my box now.

IÂve noticed as well that I usually end up with only espresso grounds; the regular coffee is thrown in the garbage. I'm trying to talk to these stores bout this.

Because of this recycle policy I am more apt to buy a coffee at starbuck vs. the other places.

mqchdygg: print out the corporate policy and show it to them, if that donÂt work, email the company. I bet starbucks wouldnÂt like any anti-recycle publicity.

It is hard not to sound like a nut when talking about this.

I got the same nonsense from my local Starbucks. "People only garden in the summer". I told her, "Composters compost ALL year." Got nowhere. I e-mailed the company with specific details of the conversation, but got only a "standard" response from them which didn't answer my questions. Since I never really shop in that neighborhood anyway, I haven't wasted my time persuing this. I'm doing well as it is with OPG, OPL, & roadside weeds. I have a larger heap this year than I've had in many years, even w/o coffee grounds.

Yeah, same here. I don't NEED SB's UCGs since they empty the coffee machine here every other day, and "no one in our office gardens in the winter." So I have all I need til spring.

Must also have a chat with our office landscaper to see what they do with those bagged GCs

I started getting Starbucks about four years ago. Usually got one bag. One day there were none, and I asked if I could check the dumster. Found three bags! Never went into the store after that.

I estimate 90% of the grounds go in the dumpster. Have collected about three tons of grounds since. I use a tugging tool found at the hardware store, and the bags go into a Rubbermaid container.

Boy am I in luck!! Every morning I drive my daughter to her high school which is approx. 20 miles and three Starbucks from my home. This afternoon, the manager of my first stop told me that interest in the CG's is slowing down. In fact, the customers were accidently throwing trash into the can that holds the bullets. THAT MEANS MORE FOR YOU KNOW WHO!! We share a compost pile with our neighbors...so, between my neighbors two horses and their dozen or more chickens, our two horses and four rabbits, and all those CG's we are going to have great compost next year.
Marilyn

Something new (for me at least).
I was in a Starbucks near me that I havent been to in some time. They had the free bags out in front. No more asking. And they were labeled with instructions (at last!):
{{gwi:307341}}
I managed to take home about 30 lbs (6 5lb silver bags)
{{gwi:307342}}

couldnt ask for EZier than that.

They pack the grounds in silver bags here in London, too. Not very ecologically conscious, surely?

The silver bags are what the coffee came in so they recycle the bags, I think they are pretty clever.

Peggy

The Starbucks I go to to get UCGs will only give me one bag at a time becuase they have so many people who use them. Huh? Well, that's OK, it just means that there are no grounds going to waste and that's really the point after all. I go through the drivethrough window and order "bag of used coffee grounds" and they toss them in the back of my pickup truck. Works for me! Cheryl

Alternative sources exist for coffee grounds.
My job makes tons of coffee as well as my church.
So Starbucks is not the only place to get coffee grinds.
When i go to church I bring along a large metal can with a lid. I fill it with grinds and bring it back the next week.

Where I get my ground besides starbucks i am not telling.
But my 3 local starbucks and have deal i get all grounds no exception and they get one case of tomatoes. I now have so many grounds I have grounds pile 6' x 6'x 5'.

Picked up my first bag of grounds from Starbucks. Pretty convenient to go through the drive through window pick up the grounds and be on my way. I wonder how much I can pick up at Starbucks unannounced? The way the girl I spoke to over the phone made it sound is they save grounds only if a customer requests it.

A thought for all looking for grounds:

Grounds are heavy. Many places have to pay for refuse removal, and they pay BY THE POUND. If it's a local place, or even a friendly Starbucks/Dunkin/Peets manager, you might be able to leave them a bucket and get them to dump into it for you for a few days at a time. Tell them it will save them money, and they will smile and hand it over. My neighbor has tried this with great results.

A note: this was tried with the local Chinese restaurant, but they could not promise they would not get meat products into the bucket. They do a lot of veggie chopping, but they work fast, and sometimes things might slip in. Some folks don't mind this, but some folks do. If you try leaving a bucket for grounds/scraps/etc you might have to take anything you get.

Emmie

Starbucks is getting annoying in my area. The store I usually go to now has a "designated donor" who gets all their grounds. The other one near me (which I didn't try until today), for whatever reason, doesn't save their grounds. They say they never have.

Have you seen this? Maybe you could mention it when you next go to collect your compostables.

Here is a link that might be useful: starbucks and Ethiopian coffee

We have a new Starbucks nearby,and so far I'm the only one who has gone in and asked for coffee grounds. They have always been very accomidating. Now that I'm laid off work I'll probably try to stop by once a day or so, need lots of coffee for all those leaves that are falling.

The 2 starbucks I've checked have a large metal bucket out front where they put the bags of grounds. So I just stop by and pick em' up, even if the store is closed.

Was riding home with some friends from a halloween party on Sat night. Saw a starbucks and made them pull over, then gleefully loaded 4 bags into my friend's car.

Couldn't get him to make a leaf stop, though.

I was in San Antonio this weekend and picked up 19 5lb bags of coffee. WOW I was so excited. since I usually get 5lbs a week where I live.

If you're talking about the silver bags, I think you got a lot more than you realize. I think they originally held 8 lbs each, and that's whole beans. I haven't weighed the bags in a long time, but I think they average something more like 10-15 lbs each. I weighed them once when I was checking them as luggage.

The most I've gotten at one time was 9 bags. I couldn't really use that many at once, but took them all because they said I was the first to take them and I was afraid they'd stop saving if they had them build up.

Just out of curiosity, how far is San Antonio from your home? I probably hold the record for distance--I brought grounds from the Starbucks between the office and hotel in Philadelphia home to Utah several weeks in a row until TSA opened a very wet bag and didn't close it well.

San Antonio is 160 miles from my little town. I live 2 miles away from Mexico.

Can any of you give me an idea of what the mix (ratio) of dried leaves to Starbucks espresso grounds should be? I think I could put a lot more UCG in my leaves than I did last year. Thanks

I use 4- 30 gal garbage cans 3/4 full of chopped leaves (dry) & keep adding on top coffee & kitchen scraps for the next 2 weeks (about up to 1/2 of the remaining space). I visit 2 starbs daily, giving me enough for my purposes. If I were to guess: 85% dry chopped leaves, 15% grounds, by volume. After mixing them up & if I donÂt see 140F the next day, I add more CGs and/or adjust water. ThatÂs the tumbler process.
For the passive piles: 6" hay on bottom, whole damp leaves & 2 to 3 10lb bags of grounds, mix & top off with more hay. These are my 3' & 4Â wide cylinders, 4' high. A slower, but working process & definitely producing more fungi (promoted, I suspect to lower temps and less turning).
Certainly not an exact science on my part, but I try not to repeat my composting mistakes more than 5 timesÂ.
Good luck

Davescotta,

I've heard a ratio of 3 browns to one green and I've heard 5 browns to 1 green. I personally don't worry about it and throw whatever and how much ever I have and let nature take care of it. It always ends up working out so.....

I was collecting two 5 gallon buckets of coffee grinds, that I supplied to two different Starbucks in the West Palm Beach area. Bring in a clean bucket, take out a full one. Some days they had a couple of extra garbage bags made up for me. There were days I would make a special trip just for the grinds, which for me was about 20 miles round trip. I was doing this for about a year. They were real friendly at first. They then started coming up with some crazy ideas that when I wouldn't/couldn't pick up some days that the grinds left in the bags overnight were turning into "Methane gas" in the stores. And that was dangerous. Also they thought I was using them for commercial growing. And it was too much for them to handle?? I thought I was doing them a big favor by them saving the manpower time to empty their garbage and saving them the cost of garbage bags. I did bring the stores some fresh vegetables now and then. After notifying Starbucks corporate office I got nowhere with them. Played phone tag with their district manager. So, I went to 2 other Starbucks in the area to set up buckets again. Well it turns out that once the new stores heard my name I have been banned from getting anymore coffee grinds from them. Unbelievable! So screw Starbucks and their compost program. Boycott Starbucks.

Wow...