Liquid packaging provider Sidel is celebrating its tenth anniversary in the Japanese market, supporting beverage producers using its global experience in polyethylene terephthalate (PET) solutions.
“Japan is, by value, the second largest retail market in the world after the US with soft drinks accounting for almost 21m litres in off-trade volume sales,” the company said. It also cited juices’ year-on-year growth of 2.8% and 1.6% growth within the ready-to-drink tea category as evidence that the region’s market is flourishing.
In Sidel’s ten years in the country, it has responded to a series of changing demands such as the downsizing of packaging formats, lightweighting of bottles, shrinking shelf space and a dwindling demand for variety of stock keeping units.
Eric Schaffner, Sidel’s managing director for Japan and regional commercial director for Japan and Korea, said: “The markets we serve are challenging so we have to ensure that the solutions we provide meet the specific demands of our customers. We know that we can learn so much more about those demands by being close to our customers and we have learnt a lot over the last ten years.
“Japan often leads the way in packaging technology, adopting innovations which eventually filter through to Western applications. This anniversary is an important milestone for us and provides an excellent platform from which to continue to develop and explore the considerable opportunities that Japan and the surrounding regions present for innovative PET packaging solutions.”
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