There is no end to the amount of fantastic stock we hold at Wholesale Clearance UK, as you well know. To be fair, some of it may seem more desirable than the rest. This week, the item that’s causing most excitement – for me at least – is this lot. Because I’m ridiculously generous, I’m offering you the chance to get your mits on a one off job lot of 28 Water cups 20cl, colour blue (they come in a pack of a 1000) for silly prices.

“What the hell am I going to do with them, Karl?” I hear you ask.

Well, apart from drinking gin n tonics in the garden, there’s a whole host of things you can do with a plastic cup.

Planters

Make a little drainage hole in the bottom of your cup. Add some composted soil – the sort you use for container gardening is fine. Sprinkle on some seeds. Cover slightly with some soil. Water sparingly. Grow stuff! If you wish to put organic fertilizers on them, grab one from Best of Machinery – they have the widest range of gardening stuff you can buy.

A light string

You’ll need, a quantity of LED lights. The same amount of plastic cups. You can decorate the cups if you like.

Create a hole in the top of each plastic cup. Just a small hole, remember you will want the lights to slot in snugly. You might need to experiment a bit, otherwise your cups will fall off when you hang the lights. Which would be hilarious the first few dozen times but grow wearing after a while.

Once you have them all fitting well, hang your strong and switch on. Whooop! Great for a temporary garden string lighting effect.

Electric sparkling disco ball

You’ll need 50 plastic cups
50 Led lights
Stapler
3 clothes pegs

Method

Makes small holes in the bottom of the cups for later and then build a circle of cups by stapling the sides together. You then make another circle using 9 cups above, stapling them to each other and the first circle you made. You can use the pegs to clip the cups together and hold them together while you staple. Another 4 cups at the top will complete one half of the sphere.

Make another half sphere.

Place the LED lights through the holes you made earlier. Do the other sphere and then staple both together firmly. Switch on and stand back in amazement at your awesome plastic cups electric disco ball.
There’s a tutorial you can try out here.

Create a mobile

String a cup with thread. Decorate the thread if you like, with beads etc. Hang other beaded threads off as drops. Decorate and hang.

Marshmallow shooter

You need a burst balloon. Fix the end with the knot in it very firmly to half of your cup. You should be able to draw the rubber back and twang it. Insert marshmallow into your gun and shoot marshmallows at your boss/ kids/ wife/ dog.

Simple storage solution

Now this is clever. No really! Stick the cups to a stiff base, such as a sheet of cardboard, fairly close together. You can then store bits n bobs in the cups without fear of them falling over. Store the whole thing in a cardboard box, or plastic container, and even add layers if you have the space.

Create a trophy for Father’s Day (or something similar)

All you need is glue, card, pipe cleaners, paint brushes, paint, and craft decorations/supplies (glitter, foam letters, etc.) Glue two cups bottom to bottom. Add some cardboard handles and decorate. Yay! Let’s hear it for fathers!

Make some monsters

Paint your cup if you only have clear ones, or cover them in coloured paper, felt, magazine cuttings etc. Draw a face on some cardboard and stick that on. Cut out some arms and stick those on. Add some wool or a big tufty feather headdress.

Take your second cup and cut the top inch off. Turn it upside down and then sit your monster on top. Hey presto your monster has legs!

Little Christmas decoration

With a needle and thread, pull the thread through the top of the cup. You can bead this later if you wish, to make it look pretty.

Create a stiff bottom for the cup and decorate this in a festive scene – in this photo we have a little reindeer model. The Christmas trees are made from the top of bottle brushes. Add some snow and a bit of glitter and it’s a perfect homemade decoration. Glue the cup carefully to the bottom and display.

Jelly fish

Another great hanging idea for your kids’ bedroom – as long as they’re not freaked out by jelly fish as I am. Ugh. Tentacles!

You can make the tentacles using wool, or plastic, or pipe cleaners or bits of material. Whatever you have to hand really. Glue securely to the bottom of the cup. Decorate the cup with a friendly face (or sinister if that’s more your style). Turn it upside down and let it do its monster-of-the-deep impression.

Stack attack

Here’s a great game to challenge your work colleagues to on a Friday afternoon or a slow day. Objective: Stack 28 plastic cups in a pyramid shape, and then unstack them all again. You have 60 seconds. Points awarded for neatness. Go.

Plastic flower decorations

Dead easy this. Snip your cup from the edge to the outer centre ring. Make petals. Decorate your petals and then stick or staple the petal onto a stick or small tree branch. Alternatively give it to you dog. My dog can turn a yoghurt pot into this shape with no effort at all.

Over to you

Here’s 100 plastic cups. What are you going to do with them? Comment below or come and chat to us on Facebook.