Plastic Cups For Water Coolers and Vending: How to Choose

Disposable Plastic Cups for Water Coolers and Vending Machines

Unless you are from the vending or watercooler industry, a plastic cup is just a plastic cup. However, if you are purchasing plastic cups, you need to know what cup offers the best value for money. To make that choice, you need to know what type of plastic cup is the best fit for the application.

What is a Vending Cup?
A vending cup is specifically designed and manufactured to perform at 99.99% efficiency in a complex piece of equipment that is a fully automatic vending machine. Because of this, they are manufactured to very precise specifications and tend to cost more than water cooler cups or drinking cups that don't need plastic cups manufactured to the same tolerances.

Plastic vending cups are made from High Impact Polystyrene (HIPS) (code 6 for recycling) and are usually available in white, mocha and two-tone brown/white. They are quite often used with water cooler dispensers so as not to have to stock 2 different products.

They come in 3 basic sizes:
• 7oz. Tall (a 7oz. capacity cup with a nominal 70mm rim diameter)
• 7oz. Squat (a 7oz. capacity cup with a nominal 73mm rim diameter)
• 9oz. Tall (a 9oz. capacity cup with a nominal 73mm rim diameter) 

The UK market is unique in that is has the 2 distinct rim sizes which goes back to the 60s when Vending was in its infancy and we adopted both the U.S standard of 73mm and the European standard of 70mm as both continents were supplying machines to the U.K. It important to note that most Vending Machines have fixed cup splitters and the correct rim size cup must be used to avoid machine failures.

Vending Cups are totally re-cyclable and there is a national scheme called Save-a-Cup which takes them away for re-cycling into non food grade products.

What is a Water Cooler Cup?
A water cup can be anything which holds a required amount of water for the consumer – but you probably guessed that much, and there are some additional considerations.

Most Water coolers have a built in cup dispenser which is designed to take a rim diameter between 70mm and 78mm. Some people will use a vending cup as they already use them for their vending machines but most will use a clear cup for presentation reasons.

The most popular material for Water Cooler Cups is clear polypropylene for the reasons of clarity and cost effectiveness as they contain less material than Vending Cups.

The most popular size is a 230ml. 300ml plastic cups for water coolers are available but with the limitation on a 70mm rim diameter this product can prove to be unstable when near to full.

Polypropylene Cups are totally recyclable and the number 5 on the base of the cups is the internationally recognized number for this material. There is a company called Save-a Cup who will take away used Water Cooler Cups – recycling them into non food grade products.

Why Buy From Regalzone?
Regalzone specialises in plastic cups and plastic glasses. We have direct links with the manufacturers which enables us to give the keenest pricing. Our minimum order value is £500, but £250 if you can pick up direct from our warehouse.