Local paper straw company to supply all Wegmans cafes and restaurants

A Rochester based company that makes paper straws has just landed a big account.

Roc Paper Straws launched last year, making a variety of what the mother-daughter team of Kathryn and Karrie Laughton said are high-quality, eco-friendly paper drinking straws.

This week it was announced that Wegmans has picked that Rochester company to provide straws for all of the Wegmans Market cafes, restaurants and corporate websites across the 110 store supermarket company.

Jason Wadsworth, Wegmans packaging, energy and sustainability category merchant said that his company had been sourcing straws from a business out of Arizona previously, so it was a natural decision to pick a local supplier.

"We’re always looking to bring things closer to our stores and that's really something that helps us reduce our carbon footprint," said Wadsworth, "so when we found out about Roc Paper Straws, it was just kind of in the cards to make that work."

Wadsworth also said after testing the product from Roc Paper Straws at its local Next Door and Amore restaurants, they found the locally-sourced straws to be better quality than what Wegmans had been using.

The supermarket moved to using paper instead of plastic straws at its restaurants and cafes a few years ago.

Karrie Laughton said the Wegmans deal gives Roc Paper Straws a big boost.

Roc Paper Straws will be supplying Wegmans with more than 150,000 straws every month.

"This is huge, it's finally going to get us to a point where we can take a little bit of a breath and get more comfortable and hopefully this is going to lead us to other, bigger accounts," said Laughton.

She noted that, "it's tough these days for a small business to start out, especially during this stuff. We’ve just been through the pandemic and everything, so this is huge for us," and Laughton said this contract will help Roc Paper "keep our head above water, and hopefully, it’ll get us a lot more publicity."