By James Atkinson
The green, embossed bottle developed for Carlton United Brewers' new Victoria Pale Lager continues a trend for brewers to use innovative glass packaging to differentiate their products.
Manufactured by Owens-Illinois (O-I) at its Sydney plant, Victoria Pale Lager is currently Australia's only beer bottle with a fully-embossed label panel, O-I says.
The classic green stubby bottle's design was developed by CUB's brand design agency Cowan, drawing on the masculine shape of the traditional Victoria Bitter stubby.
O-I Australia business manager – beer, Peter Sexton-Bruce, told TheShout the innovative packaging follows on from the application of the new internally embossed Vortex bottle for DB Breweries' Tui Lager and Gage Road Brewing's Wahoo Premium Ale.
"This is just the start of what consumers will see in the marketplace as we continue to work with customers on new product development," he said.
Sexton-Bruce revealed sales of Gage Road's Wahoo brand had been boosted by the Vortex bottle, which MillerCoors last year claimed had improved sales of its Miller Lite brand by 5 per cent.
He said innovative glass packaging gives consumers an impression of premium quality, and the production expense is marginal on higher volume products.
Sexton-Bruce said the "heavy, deep embossing" of the Victoria Pale Lager makes it stand out from the others on the shelf, and further engages consumers when they grip the bottle in their hand.
He said the Pale Lager bottle was the result of O-I engaging CUB in the manufacturer's 'glass smart' program, which combines deep customer engagement with the company's own intensive research to produce a detailed understanding of customer needs.
"We produced six fully embossed glass models and presented them to CUB's marketing team to highlight the bottle's true impact," he said.
"The CUB marketing team was so blown away by the models that we immediately began working on mould design."