We don’t think so. And certainly not in the long term. Our finance plan is to divert the cost that’s already being spent by event traders on disposables, directly to this service. That will pay for most of the running cost. We believe the rest of the running costs can be recouped by your savings on the waste management system.

Our start up costs will come from a variety of sources, including the attendees of events who want to invest in this idea, via Kickstarter, patreon, with their individual “deposit membership”.

We will also be applying for technology research and development grant funding.

We hope that partnership funding will arise from within the industry. Our industry has taken some hard knocks during COVID but we think this project is about building back better.

We are asking events to sponsor the project for the exact amount of investment that we calculate they would be due if all UK events funded the project. Events attract 140+million visitors a year in the UK, which means to fund the assets for the entire UK with our type of service, it will cost a once-only sponsorship of 10p per visitor.

What’s more, we believe that if we match the fees charged by plastic cups suppliers and disposables, we can start to REPAY these sums back to contracting events after the first two years of operation. In this plan, the industry loans their own project the money to buy the assets it needs to become more sustainable.

Because WASH-ABILITY CIC is a nonprofit, the assets remain the property of the industry in perpetuity.

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