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O-5. “One-way kegs”: Helping brewers to increase sales volumes, while reducing environmental impact and production costs

Presenter: Andrew D. Carter, Petainer Manufacturing USA Inc., Chicago, IL

A case study showing how a U.S. craft brewer brewing a German “alt” style draft beer is able to send product 3,000 miles for consumers to enjoy at 60 London (England) pubs. “One-way kegs” have allowed this customer to distribute a premium draft beer as a commercially viable global product. In addition to opening up new and distant markets, these kegs have also allowed this brewer to tackle important environmental challenges. The case study will illustrate benefits throughout the supply chain: saving fuel during transport, saving water stress, saving effluent charges, and saving energy. The commercial advantages are also illustrated. These include less capitol spent on packaging machinery, less equipment to maintain, and a smaller equipment footprint. Product quality and safety throughout the product cycle are discussed. This paper looks at the whole commercial and environmental impact. A lot of businesses claim to take environmental challenges seriously. One-way kegs can allow a brewing business to demonstrate use of a keg system that puts that into practice.

Andy Carter joined APV in 1984 and began a career as a supplier to the beer and beverage industries. Working up from manufacturing, through production control, service, and then sales, the rationalization of APV’s kegging business in 1991 led to Andy being promoted to the position of sales and service manager with responsibility for sales of APV’s keg-racking products around the world. Invensys acquired APV in 1997. Restructuring resulted in Andy’s appointment as sales manager (brewing) for APV UK at Crawley. In this role he was responsible for all brewery process sales within the Unite Kingdom and for keg-racking products globally. The following year Andy was appointed as general manager of the keg division. In 2004, he joined KHS, where he was responsible for sales of packaging plants to the U.K. brewing and beverage industries. In 2011 Andy joined Petainer as a regional sales director, responsible for the U.K. and North American markets. The specialist PET engineering and technology business is pursuing business growth in new and existing markets with development of the unique Petainer keg and other large container systems. Andy has 29 years of experience in packaging projects for the beverage industry. A member of IBD, he has lectured, trained, and published extensively in Europe, the United States, and Asia Pacific regions.

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