The site was constructed following a £1 million investment secured by Melvin Jay, the founder of The Sustainable Bottling Co and soda brand Gunna Drinks.
According to the company, the facility is the first in the UK and Europe equipped to bottle drinks in aluminium beyond water. It will produce Gunna lemonades and also provide white-label aluminium bottling to the drinks industry.
It is estimated that an average of 35.8 million plastic bottles are used every day in the UK, with only 19.8 million recycled . Only around 10% of everyday plastic gets recycled in the UK, while the majority is either incinerated, goes to landfill or is sent abroad .
The company said that it will not only provide 470ml aluminium bottles, the same packaging used by Gunna Drinks, but will also have the capacity to manufacture bottles ranging from 330ml to 750ml.
The Sustainable Bottling Co explained that choosing an aluminium bottle over the standard 330ml can, commonly used for packaging many soft drinks, brings exciting possibilities as it can accommodate more liquid and mimics the footprint of a plastic bottle on the shelf. This facilitates a “seamless” transition in terms of size and stock capacity, contributing to the industry’s shift away from plastic.
This means it is an easy like-for-like switch in terms of size and stock capacity, and streamlines the industry transition away from plastic. The other key point of difference is that, as opposed to cans, aluminium bottles are resealable so easy to enjoy on-the-go and are also reusable, again offering strong sustainability.
Jay said that he is a “passionate advocate” of sustainability and has placed this focus at the heart of the Gunna business for the past six years. “It’s incredibly exciting to be launching The Sustainable Bottling Co and be able to offer the industry access to significantly more planet-friendly bottling,” Jay added.
