Nampak milks success of lightweight bottle as sales push 500 million

UK producer of plastic milk bottles, Nampak Plastics, has announced that sales of its lightweight bottle, Infini, have reached half a billion.

Since its launch in 2012 sales of the Infini bottle have soared, with major stockists including Marks & Spencer, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s, Tesco and Waitrose helping the numbers reach the 500 million mark.

“This is a very exciting time for Nampak. For the last six years, the team has been focused on continuously innovating and pushing boundaries where possible with Infini, and this is now showing exceptional tangible results,” commented Eric Collins, Managing Director of Nampak Plastics.

“The half a billion mark is a significant milestone – we couldn’t be prouder of our accomplishments so far, and we look forward to continued growth ahead.”

Nampak says Infini is, currently, the lightest and strongest bottle on the British market. It has reportedly saved 34,000 tonnes of carbon and 16,000 tonnes of material per year since 2012, with the company’s design and engineering teams working on further innovation.

“Since Nampak helped us launch the first milk bottles with post-consumer recycled content in 2007 they have continued to deliver innovative packaging solutions for us, most recently this year’s 30 percent recycled content bottles that we are currently trailing,” said Andrew Speck, Commercial and Environmental Packaging Manager at Marks & Spencer.

“Nampak continue to push the barriers around performance and sustainability, and we look forward to working with them on more ground-breaking innovations into the future.”

In the last 12 months alone, Nampak has achieved two world records with the Infini bottle. The company trialled, tested and supplied the first four-pint milk bottle containing up to 30 percent rHDPE. This breakthrough came just weeks after Nampak created a four-pint Infini bottle weighing in at just 32g, representing a 20 percent material saving on the standard four-pint version found in supermarkets today.

Successes to date have seen Infini claim a number of industry awards, including some on a global scale, with a silver prize for sustainability at the coveted WorldStar Awards, and winning Green Product of the Year at the British Engineering Excellence Awards in 2013.