Spirits giant Diageo — parent company of Johnnie Walker, Smirnoff
and Guinness — has announced the creation of the world’s first-ever, 100%
plastic-free, paper-based spirits bottle; made entirely from sustainably sourced
wood. The bottle will debut with Johnnie Walker in early 2021.
The innovation is the result of a new Diageo partnership with venture management
company Pilot Lite to launch Pulpex
Limited — a new sustainable packaging technology company. To ensure that the
technology is a viable solution across multiple product categories, Pulpex has
established a partner consortium of leading, non-competing FMCG companies
Unilever and
PepsiCo, with further partners
expected to be announced later in the year. The consortium partners are each
expecting to launch their own branded paper bottles, based on Pulpex Limited’s
design and technology, in 2021.
Speaking of competing, the CPG industry has been working to develop viable,
paper-based containers for years. In June 2013, Danish packaging innovator
ecoXpac manufactured the first prototype of a molded-fiber bottle based on
recycled paper. Since then, the project has evolved into a collaborative project
between some of the world's leading players in technology and barriers —
culminating in late 2016, when Carlsberg Group revealed a first physical
prototype of
its Green Fiber Bottle. Then, in late 2019, with the addition of paper
packaging innovator BillerudKorsnäs and bottle manufacturing specialist
Alpla,
ecoXpac evolved into Paboco — a “paper bottling
community”
of companies including Absolut, Coca-Cola and L’Oréal collaborating
to advance the development of the technology.
But now, Pulpex Limited says it’s about ready to go to market — with what it’s
calling a ‘first-of-its-kind’ scalable paper-based bottle, designed and
developed to be 100 percent plastic free and recyclable. According to The
Drinks
Business,
while both Paboco’s and Pulpex’s designs are made from sustainably sourced wood
fibers, Carlsberg’s prototypes have an inner barrier — one a thin recycled PET
polymer film, the other a bio-based PEF polymer film — allowing the bottle to
hold beer. Diageo’s, on the other hand, is lined with a spray coating instead of
a plastic film, which the company claims makes it the “world’s first
plastic-free paper bottle.”
the exciting potential of cultivated, fermented and plant-based protein innovation
Join us as Aleph Farms, the Better Meat Co, the Good Food Institute and Plantible Foods discuss the latest advancements in cultivated, plant-based, and fermentation-derived proteins — and how incorporating alternative proteins can help brands significantly reduce environmental impacts, while conserving natural resources — Tuesday, Oct. 15 at SB'24 San Diego.
The Pulpex Limited partnership will help
Diageo,
PepsiCo
and
Unilever
advance their commitments to give their packaging a radical, sustainable upgrade
by 2025.
Read more about Pulpex Limited's paper-based bottle here.
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Sustainable Brands Staff
Published Jul 14, 2020 8am EDT / 5am PDT / 1pm BST / 2pm CEST