Cafe in Fort Worth is banning plastic straws -- and so are 1,000 other restaurants

Editor's note: This story has been updated with additional details about single-use disposable plastic bans in the state of Texas. 

You'll find vivid, artistically plated ingredients at Cafe Modern, but, by next fall, there are two things you won't see at the restaurant within the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth: plastic straws and stirrers.

Bon Appetit Management Company announced last week it will phase out the environmentally unsustainable dinnerware by September 2019. The company ban affects "1,000 cafes and restaurants in 33 states," according to a statement. A rep confirms this includes other Texas cafes in Austin and Longview.

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Cafe Modern

3200 Darnell St.

Fort Worth, TX 76107

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The company sees itself at the forefront of an growing movement against single-use plastic products, which can remain in oceans for centuries.

"Plastic straws kill marine life and choke reefs and beaches, never decomposing completely, but instead breaking into bits of microplastics, which eventually enter the food chain," the New York Times reports.

Bon Appetit joins a list of restaurants, airlines and hotels across the dining and travel industries that are dedicated to this environmental shift.  Dallas-based Snappy Salads switched to renewable utensils in 2014. Owner Chris Dahlander told greensourcedfw.org the paper straws his company uses cost "about 3 cents per straw as opposed to .06 cents" for plastic ones, but he estimated that the company's 17 locations have "saved the world from 1.3 million plastic straws." 

[Update, June 9, 2018: CultureMap reported Thursday that Snappy Salads announces it will stop using straws altogether, due to paper straw industry shortage. 

Dahlander told GuideLive via email that the decision is temporary, and the company has since received a new order of paper straws; but, in the event of another shortage, Snappy Salads will always choose going without straws  rather than reverting to plastic ones.

As for the future of more eco-friendly practices in the Dallas restaurant industry, Dahlander urges more companies to adopt what he calls a "S.U.R.F. policy" -- an acronym standing for "straws upon request for fish," as in those harmed by ocean pollution -- rather than continuing to use them automatically as drink garnishes. But, he notes, most restaurants' practices will mirror what they think customers want.

"[T]he movement will happen faster if the general public decides to make a difference and refuses straws at restaurants, bars, and hotels," Dahlander says.

Some cities, states and international coalitions have set precedents on the governmental level. In 2016, California banned retailers from handing out disposable plastic bags and, cities across the United States from Miami to New York have considered similar bans.

Last week, the European Union announced a proposed ban on a range of single-use plastic items, which will go to vote in May 2019. It has prompted McDonald's to begun experimenting with paper straws at its European stores, though that likely won't be a globally-adopted solution for the company anytime soon.

While fast-food monoliths like McDonald's have pushed back, environmental activists are optimistic this is just the beginning for disposable plastic products.

Update, June 6, 2018: Austin-based sandwich shop ThunderCloud Subs announced it will phase out Styrofoam cups by the end of the year in response to a petition from a new campaign called Wildlife Over Waste by Environment Texas. 

"Microbeads, plastic bags, Styrofoam -- they're all on the way out," Marcus Eriksen, co-founder of the nonprofit 5 Gyres Institute, told NPR last week.

Bon Appetit CEO Fedele Bauccio agrees. When the University of Portland -- a Bon Appetit client -- became the first university in the country to ban plastic straws in April, he said, "This proves it can be done, so why are we still using them anywhere?"

Cost, say some retailers. Renewable straws and stirrers have a reputation for being flimsy and considerably more expensive, especially in the quantities required by industry leaders.

Bauccio told USA Today Bon Appetit is considering new straws that will be "made of compostable cardboard-like material that doesn't become mushy," and that, while they will be more expensive, the company "won't pass the cost along to customers."

H/t: USA Today via WFAA.com