Borrow by Huskee

A turnkey reuse program for cafés, offices and events. Borrow a cup or tub, enjoy your drink or meal, and return it to a participating café or Borrow bin.

Huskee brought us in to co-design and build Borrow from the ground up. From brand strategy and identity to partnering with Particle to detail and manufacture the smart bins, and developing the app with the Huskee team.

Core idea:

Reuse made easy.

Context:

Single-use is currently the default, and as good as degradable materials are, Australia goes through 2 million coffee cups a day. Huskee wants to change that and enable the transition to a waste-free world. Borrow is a system designed to make reuse as convenient as single-use, if not more.

Outcome:

Huskee unveiled Borrow at the Melbourne International Coffee Expo in 2025, and launched the full system at International Towers, Barangaroo. The Borrow app is on the App Store, and the team continue to grow and improve the system, as well as fight for policy change to enable behaviour change.

Engagement:

Aug 24 - Mar 25

Links:

Collaborators:

Huskee:

  • Saxon Wright
  • Michael McFarlane
  • Simon Kobler
  • Caitlin Swift
  • Lucy Latham
  • Veronika Hromadko
  • David Navida
  • Hazel C
  • Tom Kulaga

Particle:

  • Daniel So
  • Gordon Luk

Fossick:

  • Mike Stevens
  • Mark Conway

Deliverables:

  • Brand Strategy
  • Brand Identity
  • Smart Bin
  • Mobile App
  • B2B Portal
  • Website
  • POS assets
  • Exhibition Stand

Credits:

  • Photography - Philip Sage
  • Typography - Mark Simonson
  • Visualisation - Sam Grimes