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Beverage giant Diageo has announced the trial of Everpour, its new keg and integrated bottle dispense system, at selected bars in Dublin, Ireland.
Beginning with vodka brand Smirnoff, the trial is part of Diageo's exploration of different solutions for a more circular economy and will contribute towards its mission of reducing the carbon emissions of its key brands.
The development of Everpour was led by Diageo’s ‘Breakthrough Innovation’ team in partnership with industrial design consultancy Hodges & Drake – with four different dispensing options to suit various bar environments. These include an optic dispenser, single or double dispensers and a back bar unit (see image below).
Everpour features reusable kegs that pipe spirits to a dispensing unit. Its technology automatically refills each bottle of Smirnoff once placed in the unit, and once the keg is empty, it is collected, cleaned and refilled by Diageo before being re-distributed to participating bars. After its lifespan, the unit is collected by Diageo and separated for recycling.
Participating sites in the trial will use stainless-steel kegs in 5 or 17.5 litre sizes of Smirnoff vodka. Each keg is expected to reduce the use of a minimum of 500 single-use 70cl glass bottles, leading to a potential reduction in carbon emissions by more than 50% per litre of Smirnoff. The new dispense system also reduces the time needed to switch out and dispose of empty bottles and minimises the storage space needed for Smirnoff bottles.
Diageo's SVP of global vodka, Stephanie Jacoby, said: “We’re really excited that Smirnoff is the leading brand on Everpour as we know how important it is to combine convenience for our bartenders and sustainability for our company. We continually push the boundaries of what’s traditional in the drinks trade and look forward to learning more about circularity through this exciting trial.”
Dave Lutkenhaus, global sustainability innovation director at Diageo, commented: “This is a huge milestone for Diageo to be trialling our first bespoke Diageo-led developed circular economy system for spirits in the on-trade. We’ve designed the system building on the years of insights we have from the on-trade with the aim for Everpour to be convenient and desirable for bartenders to use, whilst reducing our carbon emissions. We’re looking forward to seeing the results from the trial to take into our next round of product development.”
The Everpour trial will partner with seven outlets in and around Dublin and will run for six weeks. The trial will assess technical feasibility of the Everpour system whilst gathering customer and consumer feedback. The results from the trial will be assessed and integrated into future versions of Everpour before further trials.
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