Packamama equips The Wine Society with “oxygen-scavenging” flat rPET bottles

23 Sep 2024 --- Following a successful trial, Packamama has equipped alcoholic beverage brand The Wine Society with 100% recycled PET (rPET) flat bottles for four of its wines. Unlike glass, the colorless rPET bottles in the range that contain white wines have a UV inhibitor added to protect the wine from light strikes.

The red wines are packed in green bottles, which, like the colorless bottles, sport an oxygen-scavenging barrier technology that prolongs shelf life. The Wine Society recommends drinking its product within 12 months of purchase.

The bottles, caps and labels are all fully recyclable at home and collected by 99% of UK local authorities in kerbside recycling.

Packamama underscores that their flat design and lightweight compared to glass — 63 g versus glass’ average of 453 g — support carbon emissions savings across production, transport and recycling.

“According to our research, glass bottles account for 31% of The Society’s total emissions. To achieve our ambitious reduction targets, we need to significantly reduce our emissions attributable to packaging. One way to do this is putting more of our wines into lower-carbon packaging formats,” comments Dom de Ville, director of Sustainability and Social Impact.

“Although rPET might sound controversial, with today’s technology and in the absence of a proper system in the UK to collect and reuse glass bottles, the recycled plastic bottle is a good option, with a lower-carbon footprint than glass and can be recycled curbside at home.”

“While we recognize there is a plastic pollution problem, it is not necessarily plastic itself that is the problem, rather it is what we do with it. This is why we are taking a practical approach, working with initiatives such as Prevented Ocean Plastic — seeing its benefit in our efforts on climate change, rather than taking a black-or-white stance that all plastics are bad.”

Label and screw caps for carbon efficiency

Comprising some of The Wine Society’s most popular own-label wines, including its best-selling wine, White Burgundy, all four wines launch mid-September. The packaging reoutfitting comes as part of the retailer’s leading Sustainability Plan and goal to half its total carbon footprint by 2032.

Packamama specifically designed the labels to work with rPET bottles and the recycling process, using a special adhesive to make the bottles recyclable. 

The screw caps also comply with the EU directive on single-use plastics and ensure no caps are left behind and the full bottle makes it in one piece to the recycling point.

The Wine Society claims it has streamlined the shipping and bottling process to ensure the transportation of the wines from winery to The Wine Society is “as carbon efficient as possible.”

“We are deeply grateful that, following a successful trial last year, the world’s oldest wine club has taken this leadership step to permanently implement one of the world’s latest bottle technologies to reduce their emissions and contribute to achieving their bold sustainability goals,” comments Santiago Navarro, CEO & founder of Packamama.

“We are humbled and motivated to be collaborating with The Wine Society and to see them supporting this move by offering these wines at a discount to glass, and we hope this serves as a catalyst for others in our industry to trial or implement innovations to slash their carbon footprint in a worsening climate crisis.”

Shifting away from glass reliance

Innovation in plastic wine packaging comes during a time of growing industrial focus on glass alternatives. Earlier this year, Alternative Packaging Alliance, a coalition of seven wine brands promoting glass bottle alternatives, launched in the US with aims to reduce the reliance on single-use glass bottles. The collaboration seeks to reshape consumer perceptions surrounding alternative packaging, such as bag-in-a-box, pouches, PET bottles and cartons.

Collaborating with Packamama, Aldi has rolled out the “UK’s first” supermarket own-brand flat wine bottles within its Chapter & Verse label. The recyclable ergonomic packaging concept is made from 100% rPET and is available for shiraz and chardonnay options.

Alpla released its own lightweight PET wine bottles to slash emissions. The 0.75 L bottle weighs 50 g — roughly eight times less than glass alternatives. The first white wine bottles belonging to Austrian winery Wegenstein recently went into circulation in the Austrian wine market.

By Benjamin Ferrer