FRINGE WORLD is raising the sustainability bar once again as it renews its partnership with bettercup for the 2026 season. 

Hold on to your cups! After a successful debut last year, bettercup returns to The Pleasure Garden with their cup reuse system, this time with an even clearer vision for reducing festival waste. 

The initiative launched in 2025 with a simple goal: cut down single-use plastics by keeping reusable cups in circulation. With the help of bettercup’s custom deposit bins and support from Go2Cup’s dedicated wash facilities, the system created a smooth loop from bar to bin to wash station and back again.  

Thanks to the amazing effort of our planet-loving patrons, awesome cup crew, and everyone involved in FRINGE WORLD 2025, we achieved a cup return rate of over 84%, exceeding the industry benchmark of 70-80%. This meant the Festival managed to divert over 372 kilograms of plastic waste. That’s over 124,000 single-use plastic cups! Read more from the case study. 

A key part of the system’s success was the introduction of a $1 non-refundable charge per cup. This fee encouraged patrons to reuse their cups while helping to cover the operational costs of collection, transportation, washing, and stock management. This approach supports a genuine reuse system, rather than a souvenir model, ensuring cups remain in circulation rather than taken home. The reuse model is most effective when cups are used repeatedly, and the $1 cup fee is central to maintaining that sustainable loop.