We looked into whether there are benefits for using reusable drinking straws and found out there are many! Here are some of the things we found out.

Cut Back on Waste with Reusable Drinking Straws

There’s a lot to love about straws. Often, they hold the key to transforming mealtime into a fun experience for picky youngsters. And adults and children alike can agree they make any beverage just a little bit more exciting. Yet, conventional plastic straws have some major drawbacks.

Every day, Americans use and toss millions of plastic straws. One report stated that the range can add up to 500 million! To give you a visual of what that number means, consider this: That’s enough to fill 127 full-size school buses daily. The ecological impact of this waste is monumental.

Also, since plastic isn’t biodegradable, it can’t break down. In short, what that means is plastic straws become permanent residents in landfills and dump sites. There are also health concerns to consider. Many single-use straws contain Bisphenol-A (BPA), a chemical that has been linked to hormone disruption, early puberty, obesity, and even escalated prostate and breast cancer cell growth if the disease is present.

Glass Straws Fill a Need—Stylishly

Needless to say, at Modern Kids Design, we are interested in reusable straws for health and environmental reasons, but we are also downright taken by them and here’s why: There are amazing companies making functional yet stunning glass straws.

One of our favorites is Strawesome, a lovely family-run business based in the US and the picture for this post is courtesy of Strawesome. Its founders Brian and Daedra Surowiec were disappointed when they couldn’t find a safe and sustainable way for their family to sip in style. Instead of settling, they decided to create a solution. Their mission is simple yet impactful: “To improve the health and well-being of our customers and the environment.”

We can’t resist saying that Strawesome is awesome. Every glass straw represents the marriage of aesthetics and function. Handmade in the USA, they are durable, dishwasher-safe and, of course, toxin-free. The straws also come in a variety of designs, lengths, and thicknesses, making them perfect for everything from juices to smoothies to cocktails, and even to pack and send in a kid’s lunchbox—check out the lovely sets they’ve created. End result? Straws that are as safe and sustainable as they are fun to sip from.

Speaking with Daedra of Strawesome

We decided to ask Daedra a few questions about this eco-friendly kitchen staple.

Modern Kids Design: When did you both have the “light bulb moment” about Strawesome?

Strawesome: After creating our first good batch of glass straws and giving them away as gifts to our friends and family, we started to receive inquiries and requests from other people in our network interested in acquiring them. We next put some up for sale to see if we could sell them to people we didn’t know. This worked out well and we continued to expand. After a few more weeks, we were thinking this had promise. It took us 3 months to come up with the perfect company name, and the moment we figured the name out, the light bulb was lit.

Modern Kids Design: Your reusable straws provide a solution to our country’s huge single-use problem. What was the most frightening thing that you learned while exploring plastic waste in the USA?

Strawesome: Plastic doesn’t break down into anything we would consider safe for the environment. It only breaks down into smaller particles of plastic. It may never go away—ever! Think about plastic in everything—the ocean, the soil, in animals, our bodies, etc. We’ve only just begun to see the problem.

Modern Kids Design: Many people might think using plastic straws doesn’t significantly impact the environment. How would you respond?

Strawesome: McDonald’s alone serves over 68 million people per day. Imagine how many straws are used once and thrown away in all restaurants across the world. It’s likely a bigger issue than anyone is willing to admit.

In fact, we’ve come to learn that there’s an island of trash floating off the coast of California that is the size of Texas and growing! The collection is not all plastic straws, but the practice of us not thinking through how much waste gets generated (and where it all goes) points to a problem that is significant and obviously does impact the environment.

Imagine the possibilities if we did manage to stop creating and using single-use plastic straws? It might be a tipping point for solving the bigger problem.

Modern Kids Design: There are a lot of different materials that you could have used to create your stunning straws. Why did you opt for glass?

Strawesome:

• Glass is temperature flexible and doesn’t hold the cold or heat like metal.
• The glass we use is the strongest commercially available glass. It is used in coffee  pots, Pyrex, high-end kitchenware, and the space shuttle.
• You can see through it and know if it is clean or dirty. It also can go in the dishwasher.
• People already use glass for food and beverage purposes.
• With a little creativity and a torch, it becomes functional art!

Modern Kids Design: With a spectrum of different shapes, sizes, and designs, Strawesome has something for everyone. Which design does your family use the most?

Strawesome: We love to experiment and do our own R&D as we think of new designs to make. For example, we made really short bendy straws for the 3-4” small glasses the kids drink out of. We’ve also made a caterpillar, bumblebee, turtle, and frog straw. Our kitchen collection has grown into a smorgasbord of classic, hue, and designer straws of all varieties. We use straws daily and the dishwasher has a dedicated silverware compartment for each day’s dirties.

We also enjoy taking our straws in our carrying cases to our local restaurants. The wait staff knows not to serve us single-use plastic straws and educate their new peers when they see us come in. This gives us a chance to enjoy our product, set an example for our kids to follow, and most times have a conversation with someone that just has to inquire where we got them. The power of a glass straw is bigger than we can even imagine.

Modern Kids Design: We couldn’t agree more. This eco-friendly choice promises to be a fan-favorite for kids and adults. Let’s be honest—isn’t life just a little bit more fun when you’re sipping your favorite beverage from a safe, sustainable, and stylish straw? Thanks for answering all of our questions!  

And thank you for reading!