Public Question
Beer: The Rise Of The Can
For PSFK Editorial: We think we're noticing the modest rise in popularity of the beer can over the bottle.
Have you seen this somewhere - where? What's driving this trend?
Feel free to disagree too!
We'll link back to the profiles of any PurpleLister's answer we use on PSFK.com.
Thanks
Public unpaid question.
Jacob Cohen
As mentioned earlier the aluminum can provides a great place to define a beer brand since you can print on the entire container. It also says "we love beer but don't care if we're fancy."
Yet "science-wise" the brewers have a different story. In talking with a brewer friend of mine I was told that the biggest concern around maintaining freshness of the beer is the amount of light that hits the beer. This is why Corona and Heineken are both more likely to go bad than other beers, clear and green glass allow more light to hit the beer and create aging. This being his point of view he believed the cans were better because they allow no light to pass through to the beer.
But from an energy perspective, aluminum takes far more energy than glass to produce even with recycling ( about 7.5 kilowatt hours to produce one pound). So, environmentally it's much better to use a glass bottled beer from a local brewer than anything else. Cool branding or no. Luckily for ad people the environment always takes a back seat to cool graphics.
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Trent Bigelow
The can isn't just for niche or hipster breweries, the big boys are getting in on this with Stella Artois' recent "Chalice Can," mimicing the signature "lady glass." Not to mention Heineken's continued multi-year push of its "Keg Can" and it's more recent "slender and tall" can for Heineken Light.
Stella Can (need to log legal drinking age to view): http://www.stellaartois.com/presenting-our-new-chalice-can-3160/
Clearly, PBR made the can "cool again." Awesome insights into this story here: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_39/b4196062862199.htm
Large beverage companies have a vested interest in pushing cans over bottles as cans represent a far simpler supply chain and sourcing process with the added benefit of drastically reduced transport costs. Of course, these practical business considerations will be translated into environmental, ease-of-use, and design messaging to consumers.
Simply put - while the glass bottle is presently positioned as one step closer to draught, the can is the one with a brighter future. Niche beer brands will likely stand out by countering this trend.
Dylan Thomas
There is another aspect to look at here.
In the US, glass bottles are banned in almost every public space (parks, beaches, ball parks, etc) and events (festivals, concerts, etc) for safety reasons.
As outdoor activities peak when the weather is warm, many producers can their summer/seasonal brews to make it accessible and available for outdoor use. When people take to the outdoors, they want to be able to take beer with them, and if it's in a bottle, that often just won't work.
Some examples:
- The 21st Amendment (a brew pub in SF), use cans exclusively for their off-premise sales, and the only beer they can is the delicious summer/seasonal, "Watermelon Wheat".
- New Belgium, whose beer has historically been available only in bottles and kegs, started canning their summer/seasonal "Sunshine." This is the only beer they can, and I was told it was specifically to allow it into outdoor venues.
John Lawrence
I think it is not only the ease of transport and storage of can over bottle, but the opportunity to communicate/advertise. There is more usable room on an aluminum can, than on a glass bottle, to "personalize" a message. The message can be music related, localized sports team recognition related, national holiday themed or a message communicated through a QR code. There are, of course many more opportunities. Some of those opportunities may even relate to the quality of the beer.
John Lawrence
I think it is not only the ease of transport and storage of can over bottle, but the opportunity to communicate/advertise. There is more usable room on an aluminum can, than on a glass bottle, to "personalize" a message. The message can be music related, localized sports team recognition related, national holiday themed or a message communicated through a QR code. There are, of course many more opportunities. Some of those opportunities may even relate to the quality of the beer.
Neil Major
I think it's interesting that cans are making a comeback and yes PBR was a factor in the US. One thing I have heard though, in a documentary about soft drinks (AKA soda) is that canned drinks have to be over carbonated as they fall flat over time.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPbh6Ru7VVM
For craft beers this would definitely be a reason not to use them where as you'd arguably want the drinking experience to be as close as that on the day it left the brewery.
Marten Ekenberg
Can't see any trace of that trend here in Sweden. Instead, more and more of the bigger breweries are experimenting with replacing glass bottles with plastic ditto. Can imagine this has quite an effect on transportation costs. All bottles are of course re-fundable/cyclable.
Lloyd Alter
Beer in cans is a scourge, both in terms of flavour and the environment. But new tech is letting craft brewers do cans and Americans are used to cans, and so it is catching on fast. But 1) the cans are lined with Bisphenol A and 2) the wonder and beauty of the craft brewing world is that people are drinking beer close to where it is brewed. That is what America was like 50 years ago, when there were returnable bottles. Cans were introduced to kill returnables and let beer production get centralized, killing every little brewer in every community across America, and the cost of recycling them shifted from the brewer to the consumer to the taxpayer.
In Europe and Canada, everyone drinks out of refillable glass bottles. It is the lowest energy alternative, there is no BPA, and people resist cans because the beer tastes like, well, American beer in them. Americans have been sold a bill of goods that recycling is a good thing, when it is just a shifting of responsibility from the producers to the consumer and everybody bought it. Fight this, and demand returnable, refillable bottles like the rest of the world.
I have written a few posts on this:
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2010/01/happy-birthday-canned-beer.php
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/11/celebrate-zero-waste-day.php
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2007/04/its_time_for_de.php
Cassondra Schindler
Craft beer in a Can is definitely a factor. The growth of the craft beer category (11% in 2010) has been outpacing domestic and specialty beers. Within the craft beer category, cans stood out as being a point of differentiation from the previous standard of glass bottles. What began with a handful of craft breweries using cans has grown to over 75 with the positioning of greater sustainability, transportability and convenience factor.
Resources: http://www.brewersassociation.org/pages/business-tools/craft-brewing-statistics/facts
Brian Regienczuk
Good question. I wonder why it has to be either or... what about the aluminum bottle? Coca-Cola, along with other brands, have been doing them for a while now and keeping a premium price and experience. If you've ever held a cold aluminum bottle, the experience is much more alluring than a typical can. It just feels so ice cold.
Nate Graham
I think a lot of the buzz around cans reached a fever pitch (at least on East coast, USA) with the arrival of Brooklyn-based Sixpoint in a can, earlier this summer. Brooklyn brewery started canning in 2011 too. Though drinkers have been swilling PBR and the like for ages, the new-ish class of more artful beer seems to have only recently begun to make the switch. Some brewers have been paving the way for canned beer for a few years now, such as Harpoon, Oskar Blue's, and Butternuts, but haven't garnered the same kind of excitement. To note, brewers that have been canning for a while typically sell 12 oz. cans, vs. Sixpoint and Brooklyn's 16 oz. I've often wondered whether the difference in size had any effect helping to shake the PBR/Natty light connotations of mediocre beer.
Beer nerds are frequent to proselytize cans for their improved taste, resistance to skunking, ease of portability, and even the decreased carbon cost of packaging and shipping.
Some discussion of that here:
http://gizmodo.com/5622938/canned-beer-is-the-future-of-good-beer
http://brewyorknewyork.com/post/1009106545/in-defense-of-canned-beer
http://www.bonappetit.com/magazine/2010/01/the_beer_can_revolution
Scott Lachut
Way back when I always appreciated the price point and romanticism of the six pack of cans. Pull one out for the road (walking of course) and that open ring instantly becomes a convenient method for carrying the other five, adding some additional utility into the mix.
From a quality perspective, I've been lead to believe that the can is actually the best method for storing beer, as glass bottles (white, green and brown) let too much light in, which in turn lowers the freshness of the brew. While this makes sense, it's not an intuitive enough leap to make as a consumer, particularly if you're charging the same or more for cans, which traditionally have been considered "lower class". Stigmas and public perception are hard obstacles to overcome. When this quality argument was explained to me by a Pork Slap rep, I argued that beer brands weren't doing a good enough job of educating their customers in this regard.
From a packaging design and aesthetics perspective, it seems that beer can, particularly tall boys, offer a bigger canvas on which to create interesting graphics, though, no label to peel off when the conversation gets awkward.
In addition to Pork Slap, I think the folks at Six Point, a local Brooklyn Brewery, are doing some cool stuff with cans. They recently started putting together 20oz. four packs of their beers. Classy, but sadly no rings to speak of.
-S
Alex Hillinger
I'd say the rise of the can vs bottle is a major beer trend. It's something I've been seeing and thinking about a lot lately (as I drink my can of Modelo).
Here's what I think is driving it, and as usual, it's not just one factor but a confluence of factors:
1. The popularity of PBR. PBR reintroduced cans to many of the erstwhile microbrew drinking public with its neo-Americana hipster chic cans.
2. Bottles say "recession, what recession?" Cans say "at least we can drink cheap beer."
3. Cans are WAY more environmentally benign than bottles. Cans take much less energy to produce, aluminum takes less energy to recycle than glass, and here's the biggie...cans take up less space and less weight to transport than the equivalent amount of glass bottles, hence the carbon footprint of cans is significantly less than it is for bottles.
4. Cans are fun to crush. (OK, not so sure that's a factor in their popularity, but it sure is true.)
- Alex Hillinger
Peter Surrena
In Philadelphia, it's definitely becoming a trend. Percy Street BBQ offers only draft and cans...and there's 60+ cans. Not to mention, Dale's Pale Ale is in most decent bars.
Is it better or worse doesn't seem to be the point even though people will argue it. Craft beer used to be a sort of secret society but now it's everyday, it's accessible and the journey for that special bottle may only take you across the street. So, once an initiate and now a common folk.
Searching for that special beer in can form is a new journey...
