Many of us buy our takeaway coffee to the office to wake us up in the morning or to energize ourselves in the afternoon. Sometimes we buy it with our own to go coffee cups but sometimes we just use disposable cups for our convenience. The interesting thing is that most of us have our own mugs in the office so if there is a container to transport liquids, our reliance on disposable cups may reduce.
To make it real, we need to take advantage of RFID technology and form an organisation to control the system. The RFID track tag with stored information would be embedded in the tracked coffee/tea /juice pot, cups or mugs. The RFID reader would be in the machines and the equipment of the coffee shops. To rent, the user must register an account and make deposits. A QR code would be sent to the user for identification. Just pass the QR code over the scanner area to rent or return a container. The users would be charged a standardized fee which would be deducted from the account automatically. Value could be added to the account at any time and users would be able to know the locations, updates and usage status from a website or an app.
Containers are with a lid, but for cost consideration, only the container itself would be attached a track tag. So to make sure that each item is being returned completely and no breakage, a weight sensor would be inside the machine. If the user forgets to return the lid back, the expense of the lid would be deducted from the user's deposits. But if the user return the lid few days later, the value of the lid would be added to the user's deposits automatically. Users are encouraged to wash the container after usage although each item would be in the process of cleaning, disinfection and sterilization for health care when the user return back. To save money, the thermal or electrical energy would be converted from solar power.
A container could be rented out from machine A and retruned back to machine B. Each record would be sent to the management team. If a machine have no container to rent, they have to inform the related unit to relocate containers. Since the RFID reader would also be placed in the equipment of the coffee shops, the sales revenues from the rental containers could be tracked as well. If the rental income is not enough to pay the operational expenses. The management team would allocate the expenses to shops by the percentage of their sales revenues monthly.
With the system, people could reduce the usage of disposable cups and shops could do social responsibility as well.
7 comments
Join the conversation:
CommentJanne Asikainen
dientsmaker
OpenIDEO
Kate Rushton
Kate Rushton
dientsmaker
Christel Tardif