PETpla.net Insider 03 / 2014

EDITOUR REPORTS 15 PET planet insider Vol. 15 No. 03/14 www.petpla.net gradually expanded and the move to Jau in the Federal State of Sao Paulo in 1950 saw the foundation stone for the present-day factory being laid. The proclamation of the Republic of Brazil on Novem- ber 15, 1889 was, commercially-speaking, so important for the Zugliani family that the number 15 was adopted as a brand name for the beverages and is still in existence today. Change to PET bottles Originally glass bottles were used for packaging all drinks. Then, in 2000, they gradually went over to dispos- able PET. However, there still remains a substantial market for re-usable glass bottles and Zugliani has been kept con- sistently busy over the years to meet market requirements which currently amount to 10% of production.The overall bottling capacity is 800,000l/ month of carbonated soft drinks. The flavours range from Guarana (a native fruit widely used in S American soft drinks. Its seeds contain more caffeine than coffee beans!), Soda Lemonade, Orange, Cola right through to Crazycat energy drinks. The most popu- lar flavour by far is Guarana, at 50%, followed by Soda Lemonade at 13% and Cola, which has over the years moved from the shadows to take a 16% share, and this is rising. The bottle sizes in PET range from 250ml, 600ml, 1l right through to 2l, which accounts for over 75% of the market. The reason is that for the Brazilian consumer, the 2l PET bottle is “family size”, and very typical of the region. Bottling operation In the bottling opera- tion we saw a PET bottler of the Brazilian brand Zegla. A capacity of 3,000 6-pack trays is achieved in an 8h a day, single shift operation. The PET bottles come from the region covered by Blow PET and the plastic closures (BPF) from Aro in Rio de Janeiro. However, the design of the bottle is owned by Zugliani. The investment is still too high to think about lightweighting in the area of the closure and neck finish. There is one remaining bottling line available with wash- ing machine and crown cork closing device for bottling four drinks in 600ml recyclable glass bottles. Fruit concentrates and aromatic flavourings are ordered from Brazilian fruit processors, mixed here in the factory and fed to the bottling machine together with the carbonic acid.The PET filling line made in Brasilia undergoes appro- priate modifications for the different bottle sizes. 2014