Starbucks' Halloween Cups Have A Spooky Twist

Be honest — if it wasn't for Starbucks, would you even know what season it is right now?

That fin-forward mermaid has been slinging coffee since 1971 (bless her), and keeping everyone from Seattle to Salem awake, alive, and alert with her special brand of beans (via Starbucks). But she also serves as a harbinger of the season, decking the halls with holiday lattes come wintertime, or cooling down the masses with refreshing tropical flavors each summer. And while our ancient forebearers marked the approaching harvest time by charting the stars, feeling the soil, or marking the "autumnal equinox" (bless them), we all know now that the arrival of the pumpkin spice latte is a far more accurate and efficient tool for announcing the start of the fall season.

Well, 'Bucks fans, that seasonal siren has sounded the call once again, alerting PSL enthusiasts that something wicked this way comes, and if you like October, spooky things, and saving the environment, you're going to love Starbucks' new Halloween cups. None of the new items in their haunted line-up are above the $30 mark, but each is specifically designed to hold your coffee in the scariest possible fashion, while still giving you that peaceful self-assurance that comes with saying "no" to a disposable cup. And the best part is, anyone who was ever a child will love the Halloween cups' spooky twist.

As former children ourselves, we can promise you that Starbucks has taken the best thing about childhood — that is to say, stuff that glows in the dark — and put it in their new Halloween cups (via Starbucks). The seasonal drinkware features various spooky things (old trees, ominous ravens, pairs of floating eyes, and the like) all highlighted, literally, with a bit of whatever sinister material it is that makes things glow in the dark. Tumbler with crackle pattern? Glows. Mug of the night sky? Of course, it glows. A bedazzled, periwinkle Raven-adorned cold cup? Bro you know it glows. Starbucks even did a special, glow-in-the-dark version of its "Bling Cup," the drinkware with a cult-like following. Spooky, because of cults.

According to CNBC, the scariest thing Starbucks could think of this Halloween season was climate change, and the effects of single-use plastic on the environment (and, ahem, Starbucks' particular contribution to those effects). Sipping from a cup with a Starbucks logo on it has always been something of a status symbol, indicating how much you're willing to pay for a cup of joe; but Starbucks worldwide is responsible for about 7 billion disposable cups in the trash every year, what that symbol represents today could be on ice thinner than the polar caps. Is a line of spooky drinkware enough to convince Starbucks lovers that reusable cups are the way forward? If glow-in-the-dark can't do it, nothing can.