So here we are at the end of 2024, and what an incredible year it’s been again for us.

Highlights of the year included launching and running two Plastic Free Markets (thanks to the sponsorship from TravelMaster and Gripple), Thornbridge Brewery hiring 900 cups for the Crossed Wires Podcast Fringe Festival, and Sheffield City Council’s Waste Committee agreeing to set up a Task and Finish Group to pursue reducing single-use plastics!

On the not so good front, our Reusable Coffee Cup Scheme was scrapped and this was really devastating for us since our volunteers put so much time into visiting cafes to talk about the scheme. We really hope that in the future this is something that is revisited, even if it’s just in one neighbourhood such as Crookes, Nether Edge or Meersbrook.

This year we want to say a particular thank you to Steam Yard, Thornbridge Brewery and St Marys Bramall Lane for storing our reusable cups – these incredible organisations have been true supporters of our mission to reduce single-use plastics and we are truly grateful for them.

We want to say a huge THANK YOU to everyone who engaged with Sheffield Action on Plastic and helped us to engage with the Sheffield public and raise awareness/make a difference to tackle single-use plastics. THANK YOU to our incredible volunteers for giving up their time to support us.

• January 2024
  • We launched a new petition calling for Sheffield City Council to install and maintain drinking water refill stations. We learnt in Dec 2024 that the Council will be installing a new one as part of the Heart of the City development – so we definitely class this as a WIN!
  • Thanks to ShefFood, an article about our reusable coffee cup scheme was published in the Sheffield Telegraph
  • Our Chair, Greg, went onto BBC Radio Sheffield to talk about the petition
• February 2024
  • We had a stall at the University of Sheffield Refreshers Fair, recruiting students to join our team
  • We had a stall at the Sheffield Vegan Market talking to people about plastic free swaps and promoting our first Plastic Free Market
  • DANA and The Hop Coffee signed up to our Reusable Coffee Cup Scheme
  • We were awarded £1500 from LUSH to purchase more reusable cups – unfortunately these weren’t able to be ordered until Dec 2024 due to storage space
• March 2024
  • We started promoting our Plastic Free Market due to take place in April, announcing the stallholders trading
• April 2024
  • We continued to announce the stallholders at the Plastic Free Market
  • On 14th April, we held Sheffield’s first ever Plastic Free Market, bringing stallholders, food traders, and musicians to Trafalgar Warehouse, sponsored by TravelMaster. We were delighted to receive lots of interest from attendees visiting and student journalists covering the event. Throughout the day there were just over 300 attendees and the event was a great success!
  • We were delighted to be invited to join The University of Sheffield’s Earth Day Fair (People vs Plastics) where students raised money for us through a charity bake sale, and nominated our Chair, Greg, as Activist of the Month. We are hugely grateful to Alyssa and the Sustainability Committee for supporting our mission to reduce single-use plastics
  • It was Reusable Nappy Week and we were happy to promote the fantastic work of Sheffield Sling Surgery and Library!
  • Our Treasurer, Catherine, went onto BBC Radio Sheffield to promote our Reusable Cup Hire Scheme!
• May 2024
  • It was announced that wet wipes with plastic will be banned
  • For the local elections, we encouraged supporters to write to their local Councillors and vote for councillors who care about reducing single-use plastics
  • We had a stall at Dev Fest on Devonshire Green, engaging with visitors about making Plastic Free swaps
  • The time came for us to vacate Steam Yard for our reusable cup storage
  • We had a stall at Sheffield Food Festival where visitors signed our petition and found out about Plastic Free swaps
  • We were contacted by Thornbridge Brewery who stated they wanted a Plastic Free bar as part of the Crossed Wires podcast festival fringe venue on Cambridge Street. Thornbridge hired 900 cups from us – a new record and were true Plastic Free Champions. Not only did they hire our cups, they also used a £1 levy scheme as a fundraiser for us. We are truly thankful to this amazing business
• June 2024
  • We celebrated World Environment Day, World Oceans Day, World Refill Day, Plastic Free Fathers Day and Plastic Free Beauty Day!
  • We held our AGM celebrating our achievements since we launched as Sheffield Action on Plastic. Read more on our impact report
  • We provided our reusable cups for a Eco Swaps Coffee Morning at Broomhill Library
  • We launched a membership scheme
  • We were invited by the Showroom Cinema to a screening of Plastic Fantastic as part of the UK Green Film Festival. After the film we facilitated a discussion into the film’s topics
• July 2024
  • We celebrated Plastic Free July by sharing Plastic Free swap ideas
  • For the second year, our reusable cups were used at Walkley Festival
  • We held a great volunteer social playing interactive darts. Our volunteers make the organisation, and we’d be nothing without them so it was great to be able to celebrate
  • We held a stall at Sharrow Festival engaging with people about Plastic Free swaps they can make
  • We held a stall at Stannington Festival engaging with people about Plastic Free swaps and collecting petition signatures
  • We were invited by The Apple Shack to give a talk about how individuals can reduce single-use plastics in their lifestyle
  • We announced the closure of our Reusable Coffee Cup Scheme. We would like to thank the businesses and volunteers that helped with trying to roll this out and maybe it will restart some day
  • Tramlines Fringe returned and saw the horrific number of single-use plastic cups used by bars across the city centre. We really hope that this will be addressed soon
• August 2024
  • We shared ideas such as a Plastic Free beach day
  • We started counting down until our November Plastic Free Market
• September 2024
  • We celebrated Second Hand and Sustainable September, Zero Waste Week and World Clean Up Day
  • We were invited by Sheffield Museums for a stall at Kelham Island Museum as part of Kelham Nature Day. This featured a fun Hook the Muck game designed by our volunteer Carmel Page
  • We were delighted to be invited to a screening of Plastic People: The Hidden Crisis of Microplastics as part of Festival of the Mind. Our Chair, Greg, joined a panel discussing the film afterwards
  • We continued our countdown to our November Plastic Free Market
• October 2024
  • We started to build excitement for our November Plastic Free Market by announcing the stallholders trading and musicians performing
  • We shared Plastic Free Halloween tips
• November 2024
  • We held our second Plastic Free Market at The Steamworks, sponsored by Gripple! It was a fantastic success with 40 stallholders, food and drink and live musicians including college and University students
  • We started sharing Plastic Free Christmas swaps, just as the Sheffield Christmas Market arrived, yet again using thousands of single-use disposable cups
  • We announced that our markets are shifting to a new name for 2025… The Sheffield Sustainable Markets, and a new venue… Victoria Hall in Sheffield City Centre
• December 2024
  • We continued to share more Plastic Free Christmas tips
  • We announced a competition to win a voucher at The Bare Alternative
  • Over a year waiting, we finally got a meeting with the Sheffield City Council Waste and Street Scene Committee Councillors, who agreed to carry out an audit on what they currently do to reduce single-use plastics, set up a Task and Finish Group to work on this issue, and look into pushing for reusable cups to be used at the Sheffield Christmas Market when their contract ends in two years! A HUGE success!

Here’s to taking more action on plastic in 2025!