PETpla.net Insider 11 / 2010

REGIONAL MARKET REPORTS 17 PET planet insider Vol. 11 No. 11/10 www.petpla.net will not tell you anyway.”- he told us a lot about himself, his aims and ambitions. Two major topics have priority on his agenda. In these topics he is both aggressor and defender, provoking and under pressure. The aware public is his arena for the conflict. No. 1 topic – tap water versus bottled water A campaign was launched by Syndicat des Eaux D’Ile- de-France (Sedif), the public water utility that serves four million inhabitants in the region surrounding Paris. Sedif was spreading its message through posters that displayed bottles resembling known brands (Papillaud’s Cristaline for instance) and labelled “Eau du Robinet” or tap water. The posters carried provocative texts like “You’re free to pay 100 times more” or “Ideal for those living on the fifth floor without a lift” and “What could be more environmental than no packaging at all?” Being the bottler of France’s most popular min- eral water Papillaud hit back with a campaign similar pro- vocative - implying that the capital’s tap water is undrink- able and polluted. In the name of his “eau minérale” Cristaline he cov- ered Paris with posters show- ing an open lavatory with a red cross and a tagline: “I do not drink water that I use.” No 2 topic – France 5 versus Syndicat des Eaux de Sources The television network France 5 on 14th of March reported about plastics in general and categorically stated that “it is difficult to recycle plastics”. The Syn- dicat des Eaux de Sources (Sedif) disproved this offi- cially. Papillaud with less diplomacy insisted, when we met him: “PET is not plastic. Because PET can be recy- cled to 100%.” It may be dif- ficult to argue that collecting and recycling plastics is an easy job. And PET surely is plastics. But the issue indis- criminately carried into the TV public is a sensitive issue – in view of the 3.5 billion litres of water consumed in France and 7.2 billion litres bottled in France, as well as putting the jobs of 2,500 to 3,000 French people at risk as well as in view of the many recycling projects that exist to the use of recycled material in new bottles by beverage companies. Papillaud himself has started reprocessing PET – fully committed, yet apparently without much pleasure. The flakes, which he at present produces, are – so far – subse- quently extruded and granulated at added cost. But whatever this entrepreneur started he has eventu- ally carried through to success against all odds. This will surely and in future include making food grade PET resin for new bottles to be filled.