Coffee grounds collections for composting
The Story Behind the Solution
I grew up with a frugal single mother—nothing went to waste in our home. Even yogurt’s penicillin growths were scraped off and eaten! When I moved to Australia, I worked in various roles, including hospitality, where I witnessed perfectly edible food being thrown away at venues like the Hilton.
So, when I decided to start my own impact, organic waste was a no-brainer. Coffee grounds, in particular, offered a perfect stream to divert from landfill—something entrepreneurs around the globe (including Reground in Melbourne) were already doing.
Understanding the Challenge
Coffee grounds are a rich source of nitrogen that generates methane when sent to landfill. According to data I started tracking in 2021, around 75,000 tonnes of coffee grounds end up in Australian landfills.
From my experience, average cafes produce between 1 and 4 120L bins of coffee grounds per week, while extra-popular cafes can generate up to 3 120L bins. I even serviced a busy roastery in Osborne Park that produced 5 bins every fortnight.
Creating a Circular Economy Solution
In 2021, I bought a van, secured the first batch of bins, and signed up a few cafes (mostly female-owned). Coffee grounds are very dense, so I had to install an electric winch in my van to handle 85-kg bins.
The great thing about coffee grounds is that they’re an easy waste stream to separate with minimal contamination (except for a few special cafes that didn’t commit to training their staff).
My key achievements included:
- Diverting 71.5 tonnes of coffee grounds from landfills
- Converting them into rich compost through local community gardens and a family-run composting business
Navigating Challenges and Finding New Solutions
- Cost issues: Landfill is cheaper than our collection service, so many owners didn’t see enough value in paying extra.
- Market limitations: There was no market for the end product—coffee grounds. I quickly started to struggle with disposing of them.
- Capacity limits: Community gardens couldn’t cope with the volume and soon became inundated.
- Organic waste collection: I tried offering a collection for all organic waste, but community gardens weren’t equipped to handle such volumes.
- Contamination problems: Commercially composted bioplastic and other contaminants meant local gardens and family businesses couldn’t process the waste.
- Logistical challenges: Driving over 120 kilometres to commercial composting facilities (like Pure Earth in Woottating) with a small load in my Ford Transit wasn’t viable.
- Local solutions: I eventually partnered with a family business called Eureka that could handle the volume and was easier to access (lovely couple—go buy some compost!). However, driving only to the Swan Valley from all over Perth cost time and fuel money.
- Direct sales attempts: I tried selling bins of grounds to avid gardeners, but interest was sporadic and the long distances in Perth meant a price no one was willing to pay.
- Giving away grounds: I even gave away bins of grounds, which nearly got me fined for littering when an overzelous neighbour reported my van dropping grounds on their neighbours’ verge.
- Geographical hurdles: Large distances between cafes increased time and fuel costs, and signing up all cafes in one suburb proved challenging. I even approached councils to subsidise the price for their venues, but to no avail.
- Maintenance and staffing: Bins needed to be cleaned manually in my backyard after each use, and finding a driver for just a few hours per week—someone fit enough to handle heavy bins and drive a manual van—was tough.
- Insurance: Finally, insurance for the service was sky-high. I had only one insurer option and paid over $1,600 a year, with plenty of exclusions.
Innovative Products: Coffee Scrubs and Soap
I also experimented with creating innovative products from spent coffee grounds. My original dream was to make coffee fire logs to replace wood, but after much research, I decided it wasn’t viable. The B2B market for biofuels (as of 2025) still doesn’t exist, and the initial investment in machinery and space was too high.
Eventually, I developed unique doughnut-shaped scrubby soaps and coffee scrubs, some of which I sold through my network of cafes. However, I eventually abandoned this pathway because margins were low, the market was saturated, and I lacked the marketing budget to educate the market. Quite frankly, my main purpose was to remove large volumes of waste, not to retail products.
The Journey Diss-Continues
While coffee grounds and organic waste remain my biggest passion, I couldn’t sustain the service any longer and discontinued collections in February 2024.
Some councils quietly rolled out free FOGO bins for businesses, making my service redundant. While NSW introduced FOGO mandates, WA opted for Waste to Energy solutions.
How It Could Work
There are several systemic changes and market factors that I believe would make such a service more likely to succeed:
- The state could ban organic waste from going to landfill.
- The state could increase the landfill levy and use the funds to create solutions for reuse and recycling.
- The state or local councils could subsidise collections for their local businesses.
- If all local venues were subscribed and committed in one area, we’d see more density, increased volumes, and less driving.