A new brand conquered by paperâeuros bottles? Diageo, the English manufacturer of Johnnie Walker Scotch whisky, Don Julio tequila and Guinness, today announced that it is testing paper-based packaging for its Baileys brand.
Consumers at the Time Out Festival, to be held in Barcelona, Spain, on the 25th and
may 26, will be able to taste the Irish cream liqueur from a dry-molded fiber bottle made from 90% paper, with a thin plastic liner and aluminum seal.
During this major test, Diageo will be paying particular attention to how the bottles travel from the filling site in Ireland to the festival, as well as how consumers interact with this new material and how they perceive its sustainability.
For this new container, Diageo called on the Bottle Collective, founded by consultancy firm PA Consulting and PulPac, the Swedish R&D company behind the dry-molded fiber production process. Jamie Stone, design and innovation expert at PA Consulting, explains: "Dry-molded fiber bottles are a huge step forward, setting new standards in the world of more sustainable packaging. But it's only the beginning.
PulPac's dry-molded fiber technology has immense potential: not only is it water-efficient, energy-efficient and recyclable, it's also viable at commercial manufacturing speeds and scale."
Several other innovations underway at Diageo
At the same time, Diageo continues to develop and test in-house, its Johnnie Walker paper bottle concept still in the development phase, alongside other paper bottle concepts.
In addition, Diageo is working on a spiral-wound paper bottle for Don Papa, the newly-acquired premium Filipino rum brand.
The bottle is currently undergoing feasibility testing and is expected to be 90% paper.
The container has been designed to replace the cardboard gift box around the bottle. This follows Diageo's announcement in 2022 of a program to remove cardboard gift boxes from its premium Scotch portfolio in order to reduce excess packaging.
The English group is also studying other packaging formats to meet its sustainable development objectives. In particular, it is testing the lightening of its glass bottles with a new coating.
Last March, Diageo deployed 30,000 aluminum-format Baileys bottles in selected European airports (Copenhagen, Amsterdam and Frankfurt), with an expected 44% reduction in carbon emissions compared with the current glass bottle.
