Latest Advance in Consumer Friendly Packaging: Beer in Plastic Bottles? The Idea is Brewing
March 1999

Imagine attending your favorite sporting event and ordering a beer. How would you normally get it? If you are lucky, you get it all in a plastic cup with none spilling out onto your fellow sports enthusiasts. In all reality, some of the beer usually finds its way onto the floor, especially if your team just scored. How can this possibly be prevented? Well, what about beer in a plastic bottle? Just doesn't sound right does it? Well, you'd be surprised!

The Importance of Packaging to Consumers

Consumers like to think that packaging doesn't influence them and that they rarely pay attention to it. They even claim that they would rather see marketers spend less on packaging so that the product's price goes down. Yet, studies have shown that shoppers:

• Use shape and color to identify a brand;
• Formulate opinions of products based on the packaging and;
• Make decisions in the store where packaging is the key marketing communicator.

Based upon these realities, it is not surprising to see radically new packaging structures in virtually all consumer product categories. Manufacturers are pursuing innovations in packaging structures that are both functional and aesthetically pleasing. Plastics are proving to meet these criteria because of their inherent capabilities for light weight, sterilizability, transparency or colorability, breakresistance, resealability, and a full range of mechanical and chemical-resistant properties. A few examples include:

• The Log Cabin Syrup package in the shape of a log cabin that enhances brand identity
• See-through packaging for Colgate Palmolive's Softsoap^® line creating a unique appearance
• Dean Foods' single-serve and resealable Milk Chug bottles make milk a more desirable alternative for "on the go" beverages
• AriZona Iced Tea reusable sports drink style package captures the consumers attention

Beer, like other products, has a market identity based on its packaging properties and plastics are poised to enhance marketing opportunities for the beer industry. New technological advances are making the marketing of beer in plastic bottles possible. To provide some perspective on the size of the current beer market, it has been estimated that the international beer market will soon use more than 302 billion containers a year, which - if laid end-to-end - would circle the earth more than 1,050 times! Worldwide consumption of beer is projected to grow from 1996's 111 billion liters worldwide to over 160 billion liters in 2006. In addition to glass and aluminum packaging of beer, plastic bottles would be another alternative in this enormous market.

Bottling beer in plastic is difficult due to beer's sensitivity to oxygen, presenting greater challenges than bottled water or carbonated soft drinks. After years of experimentation, developments in machinery, materials and bottle design, major developmental investments in plastic beer bottles have been made internationally by Bass Brewers in the UK; Brasseries Heineken of Rueil-Malmaison, France; Karlsberg Brewery of Homberg, Germany; and Carlton and United Breweries Ltd. in Australia. In the United States, Anheuser-Busch, the world's largest brewer, tested a 16-oz plastic bottle last summer in Madison Square Gardens and Miller Brewing Company is currently test-marketing beer in plastic bottles in six U.S. cities.

The First U.S. Test Markets of Beer in Plastic Bottles

Miller Brewing Company has been the most visible proponent of plastic beer bottles to date. In November 1998, Miller Brewing Co. introduced three of its beers - Miller Lite, Miller Genuine Draft and Icehouse - in unique, five-layer, oxygen barrier 16 and 20-ounce and 1-liter PET bottles to selected test markets in six cities: Dallas/Fort Worth, Tex.; Los Angeles, Calif.; Miami, Fla.; Norfolk, Va.; Phoenix and Tucson, Ariz.; and San Antonio, Tex.

The Miller Bottle, manufactured by Owen-Illinois' Continental PET Technologies, will incorporate a center layer that will include post-consumer recycled material from the post consumer bottles with barrier layers on each side and a virgin layer of PET on the internal and external surfaces. The bottle is designed to keep the beer as fresh as glass bottles or aluminum cans over a four-month period and also offer a widemouth opening with a resealable screw-on cap. To maintain the beer's brand identity, Miller Genuine Draft is offered in a clear PET bottle while Miller Lite and Icehouse will remain in traditional, amber-colored bottles.

This innovative packaging technology could be the most significant beverage packaging advance since the commercial introduction of PET bottles for carbonated soft drink bottles 20 years ago. What makes these plastic bottles even more environmentally and user friendly is that they are substantially lighter than near-comparable-size glass bottles. Compared with Miller's 22-oz. glass bottles weighing 340 grams, the 20-oz plastic bottles weighs only 43 grams and the 1-L (33.8-oz) plastic bottles weigh a mere 56 grams versus Miller's 32-oz glass bottle which weighs in at 392 grams. This reduced packaging could result in many energy efficiency savings, such as less fuel used in packaging production and transport of the product to the marketplace.

Because of their light weight and non-breakability, Miller is promoting their plastic beer bottles for use in such places as stadiums and picnics or concerts instead of glass bottles and cans that may not be as safe or convenient. According to a company press release, consumers will "get the taste, freshness and premium image benefits of a glass bottle, combined with the convenience of cans. This new package will give people unprecedented flexibility in selecting the beer package that's most appropriate for their particular occasion."

Three leading plastics industry groups, the Association of Postconsumer Plastic Recyclers (APR), the National Association for PET Container Resources (NAPCOR) and the American Plastics Council (APC) are spearheading a coordinated effort to ensure the successful introduction and longer term market growth for these innovative plastic bottles for beer. Among the initial goals of this effort are to identify new challenges to the current PET recycling stream which may be posed by the introduction of plastic beer bottles, and to develop solutions to those challenges. The groups have recognized that now is the time to identify and resolve challenges to the PET recycling stream before they become problems.

The recyclables collection community has expressed concern that the plastic beer bottle's amber tint, interior barrier material, metal cap and label could be incompatible with today's plastics recycling stream. Miller Brewing Company believes that amber plastic beer bottles are likely to be available in sufficient quantities to foster the necessary recycling infrastructure and Continental PET, the manufacturer of Miller's bottles, has announced their intent to incorporate acceptable post-consumer amber and clear PET into their multilayer bottles at levels over 25% of recycled content beginning in May of '99. CPT recognizes the need to establish critical mass for amber PET in order for it to be successfully recycled and has offered to pay a premium for amber PET (over the price of mixed color PET bales) for a period of at least one year.

Taste Tests Prove Successful

When a sample of 457 beer drinkers were questioned about the plastic bottle concept, but did not actually see, feel or touch a bottle, the results revealed the perceived perceptions which must be overcome. However, when a separate sample of beer drinkers were provided the opportunity to see, feel and touch a plastic beer bottle and then test-taste the beer, the results were dramatically different.

Overall attitudes towards plastic beer bottles were overwhelmingly favorable, with consumers rating a 16-oz. plastic beer bottle as an 8.0 on a 10-point scale. Additionally, the plastic container was perceived to have the look of glass and the unbreakable safety convenience of cans. Beer drinkers also praised the plastic beer bottle for:

• Its re-sealable top;
• Light weight;
• The beer's better taste (versus cans);
• Its comfortable grip;
• Its recyclability;
• Shatter resistancy;
• Its appearance - it "looks like glass" and;
• Its non-slip surface

The Future

While it is only cold-filtered beer that is presently marketed in plastic, heat-pasteurized beers such as Budweiser and Heineken could be next. Shell Chemical Company has introduced a copolymer PET grade that can be used in beer bottles specifically for heat-pasteurization, a process in which beer is purified after being bottled. This is another huge market for plastics since 75 percent of U.S. beer is made through heat pasteurization.

Additional emerging technologies for accommodating beer in plastic includes:

• PET with a spray-on epoxy-amine barrier coating, currently being tested by Carlton & United of Australia;
• Multi-layer PET with a barrier layer made of EVOH, polyamide, or a proprietary material, currently being tested respectively by such companies as Bass of the United Kingdom, Kronenbrug of France and Karlsberg of Eastern France;
• PET/PEN blend or copolymer with aesthetic and performance characteristics similar to glass and the durability and convenience of cans and;
• Multi-layer structures with oxygen scavengers for flavor protection.

Advances in plastics technology result in new products with expanded consumer benefits. This is true for both packaging/non-durable and durable products. In most cases, the new products also conserve resources by using less material than alternative products and the resultant lightweight requires less energy to transport. The American Plastics Council works to ensure that plastics are a preferred material by actively demonstrating they are a responsible choice in a more environmentally conscious world.

 

Additional Information

APC's New Print Advertisement -- Crash Diet

APC's New Print Advertisement -- Defense Dept.

Further information about plastic packaging

For previous issues of this newsletter, go to the Power of Plastics Archive

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