RESPONSIBILITY
Social and Environmental Responsibility
The coffee industry, as it stands, is not yet a sustainable one. Like many industries, it’s deeply affected by greenwashing, misinformation, and common practices that are neither ethical nor environmentally sound. That said, meaningful progress is being made every day. And while we don’t claim to be perfect, we’re committed to continually reviewing and improving how we operate to build a socially and environmentally responsible business. We do this by innovating where we can, learning from others who are doing good work, and supporting organisations that are driving positive change. We take self-education in this space seriously and are always open to feedback and ideas that might help us be a more caring and positive force in the world.
Here’s a few things we are up to...
Our Packaging
As a company heavily invested in sustainable practices, we’re often asked why our retail packaging isn’t certified compostable. And the answer is a pretty simple one; most in-depth studies reveal compostable packaging has a greater environmental footprint than regular plastic. It sounds insane at first, and we want to be very clear, this is a complex issue and we are not advocating for the footloose use of plastic. If you are buying single-use plastics that are certified home-compostable and are genuinely placing them in a worm-farm or compost heap, then there is no question that your individual action is better for our environment than someone purchasing standard mono-plastics only to throw them in the trash. But, if you’re throwing that certified compostable plastic in a bin (of any kind), I’m afraid to say, it’s probably worse. Part of the reason is that Australia does not currently have the waste infrastructure to process ‘compostable’ plastics. The other part is what happens to these compostable materials when they inevitably reach landfill, which is contaminate recycling streams and produce methane, a greenhouse gas ten times more potent than carbon dioxide. When you consider that less than 8% of these plastics actually find their way into a home compost heap, and that 60% of the 8% ultimately fail to break down, it is clear that compostable plastics are not a sustainable packaging solution. Perhaps the biggest issue with products like compostable packaging is the suggestion that single-use packaging, of any kind, represents a sustainable solution. The truth is, there is no such thing as ‘sustainable’ single-use packaging, full stop. The data is very clear, reusable solutions are the only real solutions to an escalating waste crisis.
Our packaging is made to reuse. Mono-plastic coffee bags like these only need to be refilled a handful of times before they environmentally outperform single-use recyclable and compostable plastics. If you don’t want to reuse it, no problem, we also work with soft plastic recyclers like Reground to close the loop on plastics that we can’t reuse. Just drop off your bags at our CBD espresso bar, roastery or any of our wholesale partners and we’ll take care of it.
Swag Bags
When we started Madding Crowd Coffee in 2017, we quickly discovered significant flaws in single-use, compostable and recyclable packaging. We also discovered an astounding lack of practical, environmental alternatives. Some roasters were delivering coffee in reusable tins and plastic tubs, enabling them to reduce packaging waste within a localised area. Due to storage and delivery limitations, however, these tins and tubs could not be used in a majority of café settings, meaning coffee companies could not conceivably eliminate single-use packaging from their wholesale coffee operations. So, we invented something new.
The Swag Bag was developed as a genuine solution to single-use packaging waste in the wholesale coffee industry. With a similar design principle to dry-bags, they have a foldable seal that allows us to squash oxygen out of the bag and two flat-felled seams that enable carbon dioxide to escape the bag as the coffee out-gases inside. The result has been a system for storing and transporting coffee that produces zero waste and prevents significant volumes of plastic from ever reaching landfill. When it comes to Co2, our manufacturing produces a fixed and comparatively minimal carbon footprint compared to single-use packaging. Simply put, the fact that Swag Bags can be reused hundreds of times across any café setting means their carbon footprint can be reduced to almost nothing per use.
So far, with the help of swag bags our humble roastery is keeping over 300 kilograms of plastic out of landfill every year.
10% of Profits Donated
Madding Crowd Coffee donates 10% of all profits to social and environmental non-for-profits. In the past, these organisations have included UNICEF, UNHCR, Doctors Without Borders and Go Foundation. If Madding Crowd fails to post annual profit, we still commit to donating a percentage of our revenue to support these organisations and provide an annual report detailing exactly how these funds were allocated.
Wold Coffee Research
We are contributors and card carrying members of World Coffee Research, a global non-for-profit focused on protecting the future of specialty coffee at origin. WCR develops and tests new coffee varieties that are more resilient to climate change, pests, and disease while maintaining the quality of strains. Through international field trials and open data sharing, WCR helps farmers choose better-suited varieties, improve productivity, and reduce risk, supporting both farmer livelihoods and the long-term sustainability of coffee.
Coffee Sourcing
Madding Crowd sources only high-quality coffee from ethical importers and pays above C-market and Fair Trade pricing. Wherever possible, we support importers like Raw Material, who represent the highest ethical standards and produce the greatest social and environmental outcomes.
Corporate Independence
By staying small and independent, Madding Crowd maintains full transparency, make decisions that reflect our values, and ensure that our culture supports an ethical coffee system. We are not owned by investors or a big umbrella brand. We are not a profit driven entity. We are a founder-run company that’s here to roast delicious coffee and do nice things
Reground
We connect our cafes and wholesale partners with Reground, who turn coffee waste into valuable resources. So far, Reground has diverted over 1.5 million kilograms of grounded coffee from landfills. Imagine this: a cafe using 20 kg of beans weekly sends 2 tonnes of coffee ground waste to landfill annually. That waste generates nearly 4 tonnes of greenhouse gases. By partnering with Reground, we contribute to a circular solution, rather than a cycle of needless waste.