Soft Drinks Lose Their Fizz Again

African breweries has had a cruel summer. First it lost Amstel, one of its premium lagers. Now, due to soaring local demand, it has run out of the fizz it needs to make its soft drinks, such as the ever-popular Coca-Cola.

The brewery has been forced to cut down volumes on some of its soft-drink brands because its bottling division, ABI, ran out of the food-grade carbon dioxide that puts the fizz in the drinks.

Demand for SAB soft drinks increased 33% between 2000 and last year, up from 11-million hectolitres to 14,6-million hectolitres. This represents a compounded annual growth of 5,9%.

Stocks adversely affected include the 500ml and 1l bottles in most flavours, including Coke and Coke Light. Also in short supply will be 2l bottles of Sprite and some of the lower-volume flavours such as Fanta, Lemon Twist, Iron Brew and Stoney ginger beer.

The shortage of carbon dioxide has been attributed to two of Afrox’s major suppliers undergoing routine maintenance shutdowns at almost the same time.

How companies as large as SAB and Coca-Cola failed to anticipate the shortage of carbon dioxide is the question on customers’ lips.

Jackie Mfeka, senior communications manager at Coca-Cola, says: “We could not possibly anticipate the current shortage of carbon dioxide, because we are reliant on our suppliers.”

ABI also ran out of fizz late last year, which led to some soft-drink brands being unavailable over the festive season.

The company was forced to import about 36-million cans of soft drinks from the UK, Singapore and Saudi Arabia in order to address the shortage.

SA is not the only country to have been fizzed out in recent months. The UK suffered a similar fate in June last year.

UK suppliers of carbon dioxide were forced to ship the gas in from eastern Europe following an explosion at one of England’s biggest producing plants, in Billingham, Teesside. The explosion forced Teesside to shut down production just as demand for soft drinks was at its highest.

SAB has decided to invest R100m in a new carbon dioxide manufacturing plant to prevent a similar situation in the future.

Michael Farr, communications manager at SAB, says supplies of carbon dioxide are still not as reliable and efficient as the company would like them to be, which has prompted ABI to take the decision to produce its own.

More: http://tea.info.md/cola/soft-drinks-lose-their-fizz-again/