FDBusiness.com

Nigerian Breweries has commissioned packaging manufacturer PET Engineering to extend its Climax, Amstel Malta and Maltina brand packaging to PET.

The order provided important restrictions including the need to use a preform that was readily available on the market to create unique shapes that stand out on shelf and enhance the brand’s impact in a new package type, while maintaining dimensions to prevent changes on the bottling line and make containers able to withstand the pasteurisation process up to 61°C.

The resulting packaging will allow the part Heineken-owned beer maker to discover the benefits of PET, PET Engineering said, including its robustness; safety during production, transportation and use; and clarity.

The project started with the technical design of the containers and, in particular, with the study of a low petaloid able to withstand the internal pressure to which the container was subjected during the pasteurisation cycle.

PET Engineering R&D researcher Fiorenza Ferrero said: “The first step of the project was to build the specific equipment to reproduce as closely as possible the client’s industrial pasteurisation process. After having validated the method through numerous tests, we took into consideration different types of resins that would allow the realisation of a PET container able to withstand the pasteurisation process normally used for glass bottles. After choosing the resin with the highest intrinsic  viscosity, in order to limit the deformation after filling and heating treatment, we prototyped different batches of bottle samples, which were tested and subjected to pasteurisation in order to identify the best performing combination between bottle design and resin. The result was three PET containers obtained using a single type of preform, with a visually elegant petaloid base able to respect the rigid specifications of Heineken. The project was completed with the delivery of four mold series for [Nigerian Breweries’] Ota plant.”