The Coca-Cola Company has announced the launch of redesigned PET bottles that are lighter in weight for its sparkling beverage portfolio. This move is part of the company’s broader commitment to creating a circular economy for its packaging.
The redesigned 12-, 16.9-, and 20-ounce bottles of Coca-Cola, Sprite, Fanta, Minute Maid Refreshments, and Minute Maid Aguas Frescas feature new shapes that require less raw material to produce. Alejandro Santamaria, Senior Director for Global Packaging Development and Innovation, highlighted the significance of this development: “We’ve been continuously working to ‘right-weight’ our bottles, incrementally going from 27 to 21 grams over the last 10 years. But we’d reached the ‘floor’ with our previous designs. Our breakthrough innovations in modeling technology, which reduce the weight of our bottles to 18.5 grams, represent a major step in reducing the amount of materials used while preserving the durability and functionality of our packaging and, most importantly, the quality and taste standards of our beverages.”
PET bottles are manufactured by injecting heated liquid resin into “preforms,” which are then inflated into bottle molds to achieve the final intended shape. Santamaria explained that the key is finding the right preform design and bottle shape features that allow lightweighting without compromising quality, particularly for sparkling beverages, which must maintain specific carbonation levels to preserve taste when opened.
The new bottles, which will be gradually introduced, are expected to deliver significant sustainability benefits. The transition is projected to reduce the use of new plastic by the equivalent of approximately 800 million bottles in 2025 compared to 2024, and it is estimated to reduce carbon emissions in 2025 by an amount equivalent to taking more than 17,000 cars off the road for one year.
This initiative supports Coca-Cola’s World Without Waste goals, which include designing all packaging to be recyclable by 2025, using 50% recycled content by 2030, collecting a bottle or can for each one produced by 2030, and reducing the use of virgin plastic derived from nonrenewable sources.
Testing is currently underway to potentially apply the new lightweight designs to multi-serve 2-liter and 24-ounce PET bottles. Additionally, a significant portion of Coca-Cola’s still beverages portfolio, including sports drinks, enhanced waters, and teas, will transition from hot fill to aseptic processing, which uses less plastic and energy by filling beverages into pre-sterilized containers.
“We intentionally started with our highest-selling SKUs,” Santamaria concluded. “And we are not leaving any stone unturned when it comes to reducing our per-package use of PET material.”