Millennials are falling in love with milk bottles again and it's a really good thing

You might have thought that glass bottle milk deliveries were a thing of the past; that they’d gone the way of iPods, landlines and Noel Edmonds.

But it turns out younger people are being inspired to bring back the milk round as they try to reduce how much plastic they use.

According to the Evening Standard, dairies have reported a “phenomenal” upsurge in interest from millennial customers. Both UK-wide company milk&more and London dairy Parker Dairies have seen increased demand for glass bottles in 2018, citing David Attenborough’s Blue Planet II as the main “catalyst” for the new uptake.

The firms said younger consumers are willing to pay more for the delivery service in order to help the environment. In fact, UK company milk&more said it has gained more than 2,500 new customers in the last month – the equivalent of five new milk rounds.

Meanwhile, Parker Dairies said on Twitter: “Thank you London, this is how to stop putting plastic into our seas. 11,320 glass bottles used by London Saturday and Sunday. 352 new calls this year.”

New customer Dave O’Neil added: “In a bid to start ditching plastic, we’ve switched to @parkerdairies, with a bit of ‘shop local’ and ‘fair price for milk’ thrown in. #plasticfree”

Charles said: “Just signed up. I read about a lot of other Londoners ditching plastic this morning. So I decided to do my bit.”

And this isn’t the only change that’s come about thanks to Attenborough’s environmental campaigning. Earlier this month, the Queen announced she had “declared war” on plastic, banning plastic straws and plastic bottles across the Royal estate. Buckingham Palace said that there was a “strong desire to tackle the issue at the highest levels of the Royal household.”

Apparently the Queen became “personally interested” in plastic waste after working with Sir David on a documentary about wildlife in the Commonwealth.

The Mayor of London Sadiq Khan has also announced a new network of drinking fountains and bottle-refill points to be rolled out across London this year as part of a plan to reduce plastic waste.

“We shouldn’t be using single-use plastics, the impact on the environment is so immense,” the deputy mayor for environment, Shirley Rodrigues, told the Guardian, adding that programmes like Blue Planet II had brought home the scale of the problem for many.

(Image: REX)