Coca-Cola Hbc Italia has invested half a billion in ten years

Listen to the audio version of the article

From bottling machinery to packaging, from cooling systems to cogeneration plants: in the last ten years Coca-Cola Hbc Italia, the main bottler of Coca-Cola branded products in the country, has invested around half a billion euros.

At the heart of the expansion are the three production sites above all: around 440 million euro was spent between the Nogara plant in the province of Verona, the Oricola plant in Abruzzo and the Marcianise plant in Campania alone. 2022 was also the year of the reopening of the Gaglianico (Biella) factory, which has now become a plant that transforms up to 30,000 tons of PET per year into 100% recycled plastic preforms for bottling. The underlying theme of all these investments has been sustainability, so much so that according to the financial statements just presented, compared to 2010 the company has decreased its CO2 emissions by 45,000 tonnes, equivalent to about 375,000 car journeys from Milan to Rome. «In Italy – explains Giangiacomo Pierini, director of Corporate affairs & sustainability of Coca-Cola Hbc Italia – we have purchased machinery that has lower energy needs and machines that use less raw material for packaging, transforming the country’s six plants into state-of-the-art plants avant-garde compared to the rest of Europe».

For the future, the goal of Coca-Cola Hbc is to grow further among Italian consumers, in contrast with the signs of restriction on purchases that are arriving in this period. «In Italy – says Pierini – we are present in territories where it is certainly possible to make new investments. I’m not worried about the short term, but in the medium term today it’s difficult in which direction we can go to invest. Until the rules of the game are clear, it is impossible to strategize. Let me explain: if the European Commission’s draft for the new regulation on plastics were to be confirmed, for a company like Coca-Cola Hbc it would be a question of rethinking the entire production model. We should assume mandatory reuse, washing facilities, storage areas for empty drinks. But above all, none of our Pet production lines would be ready: they would all have to be made from scratch».

On the national front, the Sugar and Plastic tax could also hit the beverage sector, which for carbonated drinks would lead to an increase in the cost of around ten cents per litre: «Formally – says Pierini – both taxes were established by law and they should enter into force starting from 1 January 2024. To stop them, an ad hoc decision by the Government would be needed by the end of this year”.