South African Breweries (SAB) is replacing its familiar 750ml ”quart” beer bottles with a more up-to-date model, the company announced on Monday.
The new returnable bottle will be introduced across four main brands — Castle Lager, Carling Black Label, Hansa Pilsener and Castle Milk Stout.
”SAB will invest over R500-million and about an extra three million man-hours of work in the switchover to the new bottle,” said SAB spokesperson Shirley Scriven.
The replacement of the old quart bottle will take place in phases, beginning with Cape Town in May this year and ending with Polokwane in September next year.
Both bottles will be in trade for a three-week crossover period in each region.
There are currently 90 000 tonnes of old glass quart bottles in circulation. Once these have been returned, they will be crushed and recycled.
”We decided to make this investment based on a number of key global trends and consumer-demand developments; the new shape complies with new label technology that is being introduced, including a wraparound neck label.
”Importantly, the new bottle is more durable than the present one, which has a positive environmental impact,” said Scriven. — Sapa