petwork

01/2019

A PET can could

Here is a rather novel idea. PET has lots of things going for it as a drinks container – so many in fact, that today the sight of glass bottles for drinks on our supermarket shelves, if not a rarity, is certainly uncommon. When it comes to containers in the 330-500mL range, PET bottles sit side-by-side with aluminium cans So why not make cans in PET too?

A drinks company in Asia was looking for something original in its marketing strategy, to offer consumers a package that was truly different. It wanted to give the PET can concept a try. It asked SIPA to develop a project, and the SIPA designers and engineers got to work. OK, so you lose the advantage of being able to reseal the container, but in an awful lot of cases, consumers empty it in one go anyway. You score over aluminium in being able to see the contents, so it has an extra aesthetic attraction.

PET is certainly easy to form, so the possibilities for new shapes while echoing the traditional straight-sided can, are considerable. Opportunities for decoration are many and varied. The PET itself can be coloured while still retaining its transparency, and there is great the potential for using shrink sleeves from bottom right to the very top of the can. Plus, the stretch-blow moulding process also makes it possible to introduce texture onto the container surface for a unique feel as well as look.

On top of this, the PET manufacturing process makes it possible to achieve good performance in a can with a leaner supply chain compared with aluminium cans production chain. In its laboratories, SIPA has already produced several variants of possible PET drinks can, with champagne and Petaloid bases, some of them weighing as little as 20 g. Weighing the options is now down to the customer.
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