Showing It’s Metal

Actually,
chances are, you won’t. Because this bottle is made of
aluminum, more than three times as thick as an aluminum
can’s wall. “If you smack a full one against your desk,
you’d put a dent in it,” said Ed Delia, who does PR for CCL
Container, an Ontario-based firm that manufactures the
bottles. “Probably put a dent in your desk, too. But you
wouldn’t puncture the bottle.”

There’s a new
container for beer on the scene. The aluminum bottle joins
the glass bottle, the aluminum can and the plastic bottle on
the shelf. Some folks have already scoffed and said that
it’s not a bottle – it’s made of metal, it’s a can. It does
bear a resemblance to the old cone-top cans of the 193Os,
which were essentially a can with a bottle cap crimped on.
But the dictionary says a bottle is a container with a
narrow neck and a mouth that can be plugged or capped. This
thing is all of that. It’s a bottle. But it’s made of
aluminum.

But why an
aluminum bottle? More to the point, is anyone going to buy
it, and what good does it do you? Talk to some of the folks
who are using it and making it, and a clearer picture
emerges.

Big Sky Brewing
of Missoula, Montana, was the first to use the aluminum
bottle for beer in the US – they would have been the first
in the world, says co-founder Bjorn Nabozney, but someone at
Heineken caught wind of what they were doing with the
Spanish supplier and got the Heineken H2 bottle out a week
or so earlier. (Heineken did a limited release in the US,
but has focused on Europe, where the H2 has been
successful.)

“We got our
first sample bottle in 1999,” said Nobozney. “We knew it was
something we were interested in. We don’t recycle glass in
Montana, but it’s a very outdoorsy state, and we needed a
package that was appropriate.”

As we’ve
discussed here recently, the can was available as a
non-glass package that was outdoors-friendly. Why didn’t Big
Sky go that tried and tested route, instead of a completely
new package? “Simple,” said Nabozney. “We could run a bottle
down our bottling line, we didn’t have to buy any new
equipment. And the perception of inferior quality for cans
didn’t feel good. We wanted something completely
unique.”

At the time,
aluminum bottles were just that. But Pittsburgh Brewing
followed Big Sky in less than a year, putting the iconic but
sagging Iron City into an Aluminum Bottle. For this big,
aging brewery, losing its big, aging customer base, aluminum
bottles represented more than just something outdoorsy and
different. They were a lifeline. “It revitalized the brand,”
said Tony Ferraro, VP of sales and marketing at Pittsburgh.
“That bottle is the best POS there is.”

To understand
what Ferraro means, all you have to do is walk into any
corner bar in Pittsburgh. You’ll find empty Iron City
aluminum bottles on every horizontal surface. That’s a point
Ed Martin, VP of sales at CCL Container, who makes the
aluminum bottles for Iron City, brings up and hammers home.
“It’s a marketing tool, not a package in those cases,” he
said. “A brewery asks, ‘Can I afford aluminum bottles?’ It’s
part of your marketing package! People don’t throw them
away. It’s a great grade of aluminum to recycle, it’s very
pure, but people don’t throw them away.”

Take a look at
all the advantages aluminum bottles offer. They’re lighter
than glass, and that means a lot of savings on transport.
“You can put more on the pallet, and put more on the truck,”
said Ferraro. “If you’re paying $1OOO per truckload, you’re
getting 39O cases more on a truck than with glass bottles,
and still staying within weight. Glass is 49 cases per
pallet, these can go 64.” Lighter on the truck means lighter
for your customers to carry, too, in the same
ratios.

But it’s not
just lighter than glass, it’s stronger than either glass or
cans. “It’s amazing,” said Ferraro. “Lighter than glass, and
it’s indestructible. I take them on flights for samples,
they drop the suitcase, kick it, doesn’t matter: they don’t
break.” The bottles don’t break like glass, nor do they
shear or puncture like cans. Recyclers actually have
problems crushing the cans for shipment.

That strength
means no lost product, and it means no broken glass, which
is a big deal in on-premise, and particularly in outdoor
venues (and every bit as important for off-premise sales for
outdoor activities like boating, lawn parties, hiking,
camping, and so forth). They’re hard to mis-use once they’re
empty and light, too, an added attraction for sporting
venues.

What about for
the actual consumer? There’s convenience: the aluminum
bottle gets beer cold faster than the glass bottle, a lot
faster. (Despite what you may have heard, it’s not true that
they also keep the beer cold longer; blame thermodynamics.)
There’s flavor: the bottle is coated in inert film inside
and out, and that’s what the beer – and your lips – touch,
and that’s all. No seams, no lips, no pop-top hole. And no
worry about hygiene: the bottle-cap covers pretty much
everything you’ll touch if you drink out of the
bottle.

Ed Martin touted
his product’s safe-like seal of the product inside. “The
aluminum bottle has better barrier properties than PET
bottles,” he said. “They keep out ultraviolet light and keep
in carbonation. PET bottle barrier properties are only good
for three or four weeks for beer. We think the aluminum
bottle has the best shelf life.

“Then there’s
end-use rigidity,” Martin said. “Once a can or a PET bottle
is opened, it’s no longer rigid. The aluminum bottle has
that rigidity, and that’s perceived value.”

Perception and
intangibles, however, seem to be the main reason to adopt
the aluminum bottle; the intangible ‘coolness’ of the
aluminum bottle. That’s apparently what did it for
Anheuser-Busch, where they rolled out aluminum bottles in a
big way in 2OO5. They developed 16oz. aluminum bottles for
Budweiser, Bud Light, Budweiser Select, Michelob,
MichelobLight, and Anheuser Select. The bottles are bold
graphic statements, color-clad from cap to base.

Why aluminum
bottles for A-B? “We’re always looking at innovative ways to
reach adult beer drinkers, whether through new products or
inventive packaging,” said Marlene Coulis, VP of brand
management at A-B. “It’s important to keep beer fun,
relevant and in step with the changing preferences of adults
who enjoy beer. This was an ideal way for us to enhance the
beer drinking experience. While we have no plans to abandon
our glass bottles and aluminum cans, the aluminum bottle is
an image enhancer over the more traditional packaging and
the type of look contemporary adults want when out enjoying
a beer with friends. The bottle looks and feels colder, and
consumers tell us that’s what they really like about
it.”

Ferraro and
Pittsburgh Brewing found the same thing, and in a way that
was even more valuable and important for them. “It’s unique,
cool and hip,” he said, enthusiastically. “It’s reached some
of the younger demographics we can’t really afford to
advertise to. It’s opened markets, in Texas with IC, and now
that we have IC Light, it’s opened that, too. And it follows
with the bottles and cans, because the aluminum is more
expensive, sure it is. But it’s not about price, it’s about
quality. We’re still seeing growth after 19
months.”

CCL’s Martin is
not surprised. “We want to sell a lot of a bottles,” he
said, “but for the producer the question is, will this help
me drive additional consumption? That’s why regional brewers
are interested. It gets them out of their neighborhood as a
prestige product. You don’t take Iron City to St. Louis to
sell it for the same price as in your home neighborhood: how
do you be different and get a premium product? The aluminum
bottle does that, helps the image and the price.”

The aluminum
bottle is a wedge, and entry. “A-B and Pittsburgh have used
it as an off-premise vehicle as well, not only as
on-premise,” Martin said. “Their growth outside of
Pittbsburgh has probably been through off-premise sales.”
People love the aluminum bottle, but they recognize the
premium they’re paying – and when it comes to buying beer
for home consumption, they’ll buy the same brand in glass
for less.

The aluminum
bottles cost more than glass bottles, about four times as
much, and uses three times as much aluminum as a can. In
time the cost will come down, as manufacturing innovation
and capacity increase. But for now, it’s full price for
aluminum bottles, because all the manufacturers are maxed
out. “Supply is tight,” said Nabozney. “It’s a technology
issue. Bottles can only be produced at 15O a
minute.”

So prices won’t
be coming down anytime soon, so long as the bottles remain
popular, and hip, and stylish, and so long as brewers
continue to sell them as fast as they receive them from the
manufacturer, regardless of the price.

What about when
the popular hip stylishness wears off? “You have to
re-invent the package,” said Miller. “You’re going to see a
tremendous amount of design equity coming to the package. To
create a new shape in glass or cans, you have to spend a lot
of money on molds. Aluminum bottle shapes are not done with
molds. You can change them quickly and relatively
cheaply.”

Ed Delia thinks
it is going to take a while before we see everything that
can be done with this new packaging. “It’s a whole new
category,” he said. “There’s been aluminum cans for a long
time, glass bottles for a long time, plastic bottles for a
long time. An aluminum bottle as a beverage package option
is a new thing. Whenever you see a new package come on the
scene, it takes a while to find its place. Look at edible
film. It first came out as mouthwash, now they’re in vitamin
and supplement delivery. A new idea can take some time to
find its place.”

It may be a
place that’s already been occupied. Some old-timers and beer
can collectors may remember the old cone-top cans, and
wonder what the big fuss is over this new cone-top.
Cone-tops were squatter, and didn’t sport bold color schemes
like this, but Ferraro admits there is a similarity. “I
think everything is retro,” he said. “Everything that was is
coming back, full turn. You’re seeing that with a lot of
consumer product.”

Enough looking
back. What is the view ahead for the aluminum bottle, cloudy
though the crystal ball may be? “It’s given a spark back to
the industry,” said Ferraro. “I don’t know that we’re
stealing a wine drinker, but I guarantee that we’re stealing
beer drinkers. Iron City, IC Light and Augustiner are all
up. We’ve exceeded our projections on the aluminum bottles.
We’re waiting for more.”

Coulis reported
the same story for Anheuser-Busch. “The demand for this new
packaging in 2OO5 was so high that bars, restaurants, clubs,
and supermarkets were selling out,” she said. “This led
Anheuser-Busch to double its capacity for the package by
fall (of 2OO5). Adult beer drinkers enjoy variety and new
things, and they’ve told us this is the type of package they
like to have in their hands when they are out with friends.
We see positive trends for the future.”

“We’ll continue
to see more package developments arrive,” said Delia. “When
the dust settles, the aluminum bottles will have a place;
what that place is remains to be seen. People are still
checking it out. There’s been enough interest that it will
still be around, although I can’t tell you that 2O% of
America’s beers will be in aluminum bottles in 5 years.
We’ll see.”

Customers – and
producers – are evidently willing to pay the bigger price
for now, whether for indestructibility, light barriers, or
feel-good, I’m-cool-you’re-cool perception. The bottles
certainly make an eye-catching display of rich colors and
flashy metal, and they help drive sales of their less flashy
brother brands. This looks like a good thing to play a small
bet on. You can always increase your position if it looks
like it’s going to change.