Beautiful PET bottles

SIPA of Veneto, Italy, a global leader of stretch blow moulding machines for the production of PET bottles, has recently celebrated its involvement in producing the award-winning bottles of Ramlösa (Carlsberg) mineral water. The bottle was awarded the prestigious Diamond Pentaward 2011, one of the world’s finest packaging awards.

The Carlsberg mineral water range is a popular premium Swedish drink that was previously sold in high-quality heavy glass bottles. Carlsberg was concerned that the glass bottles were expensive, difficult to handle and transport, and not environmentally friendly. It commissioned NINE, a Swedish innovative design company to work on creating a PET bottle that would maintain the customer perception of a premium range of drinks.

The team at SIPA worked on many prototypes over a year to find a functional design that could provide the sharp cuts and angles in PET but would give the appearance of a premium cut-glass look. The technical experts at SIPA produced new renderings that met the marketing needs of Carlsberg and the functional requirements of the bottle. The result was a bottle that could be used for still, semisparkling and sparkling variants of the Ramlösa water range.

SIPA supplied a SFR 8 EVO Rotary Blow Moulding machine that is now used to produce the Ramlösa 330 and 800 mL bottles inline with Carlsberg’s existing production line. The SFR8 EVO has eight cavities, a maximum speed of 17,600 bph and guarantees optimum container quality, simple and flexible operation, high utilisation rates and low running costs.

“The successful launch of Ramlösa in a unique premium PET bottle has increased our customers by 16% and has assisted us in reducing our carbon footprint on the product by a massive 65%,” said Paul Davies, Marketing Director of Carlsberg.

SIPA is represented in Oceania by HBM Plastics & Packaging Technologies.