XIXO to stop using plastic bottles across an entire product lineBudapest, February 3, 2021. – Starting February 1st, XIXO’s carbonated soft drinks will be packaged by HELL ENERGY Magyarország Kft solely in 100% recyclable aluminum cans, which can be recycled an infinite number of times. This means that the manufacturer will permanently stop using plastic bottles across this entire product line, another step that demonstrates the company’s commitment to the environment and to sustainability. In Hungary, today much of the carbonated beverages sold sit on shelves in plastic bottles, and most of this packaging ends up as trash, which is well-known to be one of the greatest risks to polluting our planet.
XIXO’s manufacturer, HELL ENERGY Magyarország Kft., is one of the few Hungarian companies that treat sustainability not only as an abstract business philosophy, but a significant part of its core strategy that shows itself in its actions. That’s why HELL ENERGY now guarantees it will be filling cans made of at least 75% recycled aluminum, as announced in their press release last year. Based on a contract signed on July 21, 2020 with its aluminum supplier, the HELL group will be the first beverage manufacturer in the world to guarantee to use the most highly recycled aluminum for all of its beverage packaging starting on February 1st. Consumers have a right to expect from the market leader that it will protect the planet with environmentally conscious decisions, and lead other companies by its example. The use of Hydro CIRCAL75 is a milestone in sustainability for the entire industry, and is a great alternative solution to stopping the unacceptable levels of plastic waste that are being generated every day.
Thanks to the company’s long-term sustainability program, it has been making ongoing improvements in the percentage of its portfolio that is packaged in aluminum cans, so that by last year 95% of its products were sold in aluminum cans. The company has also committed to reducing its total number of plastic bottles to under 1% by 2025, and stayed true to its word, it has now permanently stopped manufacturing plastic bottles for its carbonated soft drinks.
“Starting today, we are ceasing use of plastic bottles even in the largest global product category, namely carbonated soft drinks, since we do indeed keep our word! We committed to reducing the total fraction of plastic bottles from 5% to under 1%, and now we’ve taken one more step toward that goal. Besides the environmental benefits, it is important to keep in mind that 250 ml aluminum cans are equivalent to one portion, which is about the right amount to drink at a time, so in contrast with plastic bottles, this form of packaging does not lead to excessive unsustainable consumption,” said Márton Vecsei, XIXO’s brand manager.Unlike plastic bottles, aluminum cans – when properly collected and handled – may be recycled fully and an infinite number of times without any loss in quality. It is the most valuable of all waste packaging as well, meaning it gets collected and recycled most easily and most often. Some 75% of all the aluminum ever manufactured is still in circulation today, and thanks to an efficient closed loop recycling, within as little as 60 days of when a consumer throws out a can into the recycling bin, another aluminum can may be made out of it. This is very different from plastic waste, most of which ends up posing an environmental hazard for hundreds of years. According to a study by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation*, out of 78 million tons of plastic packaging used each year, only a tiny 2% gets recycled within a closed loop.
“XIXO works tirelessly to make its sustainability program a reality, which is not possible without help from our customers. As part of our campaign promoting recycling, we helped our customers collect more than four hundred thousand aluminum cans in summer of 2020,” added XIXO brand manager Márton Vecsei.
* https://www.ellenmacarthurfoundation.org/assets/downloads/EllenMacArthurFoundation_TheNewPlasticsEconomy_Pages.pdf – page 27.
