Riese & Müller’s new headquarters, which house both Administration and Production, were not built first and foremost to produce more E-bikes, but rather to create a modern working environment in the countryside with ideal working conditions for all employees. This approach also includes waste avoidance, which already starts with the smallest details.

‘Recup’, the reusable cup deposit system was therefore launched in the company’s own Corner Café and at the various coffee points throughout the building. Fabian Eckert and Florian Pachaly are the two personalities behind Recup, founders who, like Markus Riese and Heiko Müller, identified a problem for which they wanted to find a solution. Their answer to the flood of cardboard and plastic cups that spill out onto the streets every day: a reusable cup deposit system, which conserves resources and offers employees the opportunity to enjoy their hot drink in an environmentally-friendly manner, particularly in production areas where glass and porcelain are banned for safety reasons.

The 100% ‘Made in Germany’ Recup cups are food-safe, free from BPA and pollutants, and can be reused up to 1000 times. Unlike bamboo cups, Recup cups do not contain any substances that could be released by hot drinks. Riese & Müller has introduced the Recup cup deposit system in an attempt to counter the waste of resources and promote awareness of a more sustainable lifestyle amongst its employees. The new reusable cup deposit system means that Riese & Müller saves over 50,000 single-use cups each year.

However, in the new headquarters more is being done than just refraining from the use of single-use cups: a host of other measures, including the free supply of drinking water to employees, have been implemented to conserve resources. To do so, Riese & Müller systematically relies on a Brita water filtering system and the use of reusable bottles. The water can be decanted into reusable bottles at a number of taps around the building, saving the transport of over 90,000 bottles each year.