Investing in speed
Alcohol-free fruit beers are growing in popularity in Slovakia. Image: Martina Marečková
Slovakia’s can makers are investing in projects to increase line capacities. Martina Marečková reports
While beer consumption in Slovakia is not as high as neighbouring Czechia (which has the world’s highest per-capita beer drinking), it is still the 13th highest worldwide at 79.9 litres per person annually (2022 figures).
So, it is no surprise that Crown Holdings, one of the world’s largest producers of metal packaging, continues to invest in its beverage can plant in Kechnec, eastern Slovakia.
This business unit, part of Crown Bevcan EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa), exports most of its products to neighbouring countries where beer consumption is also high – for instance, Austria and Poland, respectively the second and third highest per-capita beer drinkers worldwide, according to Japan-based Kirin Holdings data.
“At the end of 2022, we invested approximately EUR€1.8 million [USD$1.95 million] in our ‘production line one’ to increase the capacity from 2,000 cans produced per minute to 2,200 cans,” said Ivan Sokirka, Slovakia plant manager with Crown Bevcan EMEA.
Later, Crown invested about the same amount in its ‘line two’, whose production capacity increased from 1,850 cans per minute to 2,150 cans: “The aim was to increase production capacity while reducing costs and becoming more competitive,” Sokirka told CanTech International.
The Kechnec facility started operations in 2010, with an initial capacity of 750 million cans per year. With the launch of the second line a year later, the plant’s annual capacity more than doubled. Four types of aluminium beverage cans are produced in this facility: 25cl, 33cl, 33cl sleek and 50 cl.
Line one manufactures 50cl cans primarily for beer, radler (beer combined with any citrus-based drink) and energy drinks. The line is also capable of producing slimmer 33cl standard cans. Line two produces taller and slimmer 33cl cans – so-called sleeks – which are primarily supplied to Coca-Cola.
The Kechnec facility was running at full capacity until about 2022. “We were working 24 hours a day, seven days a week,” said Sokirka. The production lines only paused for about ten days for necessary maintenance and Christmas holidays, according to Sokirka. All this changed after the Covid-19 pandemic, war in Ukraine and the subsequent rise in energy costs and high inflation Europe-wide.
“Currently we have a bit lower demand, but our competitors are also facing these problems,” said Sokirka. For this year, the company plans to produce about 1.2 billion cans at the Kechnec plant.
“Capacity increased overall, not just in our plant. New beverage can filling lines were put into operation, and while higher inflation decreased demand in the European Union,” explained Sokirka, that demand is now getting back to normal: “This year we will not yet run at full capacity but next year we expect to do so.”
Zlatý Bažant is one of the most known and popular beer brands in Slovakia. It is owned by Heineken and the cans are supplied by the local Crown plant in Kechnec
Product types
Energy drinks, which are trending with teenagers, are becoming an increasingly important product, according to Sokirka: “Sales of energy drinks such as Hell or Monster are growing, while demand for Coca-Cola and beer stays stable,” he said. Last year, the Kechnec plant exported a majority of its products, with only about 6.5% of cans supplied to Slovak clients such as Pivovar Hurbanovo, a major brewer which is part of Heineken. This year, Crown plans to increase its Slovak metal packaging market share to 9%, according to Sokirka.
From Kechnec, Crown supplies cans to major international brewers and soft drink makers in Hungary, Austria, Romania, Poland and Czechia. The company’s major clients include breweries such as Hungary-based Borsodi, Netherlands-based Heineken and Romania-based Albrau, as well as soft drink manufacturers Coca-Cola, Pepsi and Hell Energy.
Return systems
Cans have been the most popular package for beer in Slovakia for years. One of the key clients of the Kechnec plant, for instance, is local Hurbanovo- based Heineken Slovensko. Aluminium cans are the top package in terms of volume, with 50% of the brewer’s beer sold in cans, said Slovensko packaging manager, Eva Tóthová. The second most important package is glass bottles (20% of total volume). That is different from Czechia, where
the most important package is refundable glass bottles, followed by kegs and then cans, according to Prazdroj and NIQ (formerly NielsenIQ), which says more than 50% of beer in Czechia is sold in refundable glass bottles, with cans at 30%.
In 2022, Slovakia introduced a refundable deposit system for empty cans and plastic bottles, joining a long-standing deposit system for glass bottles. In 2023, about one billion empty cans and plastic bottles were collected this way in the country, whose population is 5.4 million, and the level of recycling of these items reached 92%, said Slovak NGO Správca zálohového systému (Deposit Return System Administrator). The system has proved to be successful and other countries such as Czechia and Poland are now following suit.
“In 2023, Heineken Slovensko supplied for recycling nearly 2,000 tonnes of used cans which came back in the form of new containers. This way we saved a lot of natural resources and CO2,” said Tóthová.
Cans are a popular beer package because they are lightproof [resistant to sunlight], lightweight and easy to manipulate. “With the introduction of a refundable deposit system for plastic bottles and cans, some consumers are returning to refundable glass bottles,” according to Tóthová.
Packaging type volumes
Ivan Tučník, sustainability manager for Slovakia Plzeňský Prazdroj, the Slovak wing of a major Czech brewer, (owned by Japan’s Asahi Group Holdings), noted how the company had stopped filling its beer in plastic bottles in a move towards circular packaging. Also, his company is encouraging the use of refundable glass bottles. Heineken Slovensko is still using plastic bottles, however – about 17% of its beer output is sold in plastic bottles.
The top package for Plzeňský Prazdroj Slovensko is cans (in 2022 they accounted for 42% of volume) followed by glass bottles (33%), with 22.5% of beer sold in metal kegs. The company sources its kegs from Schäfer Container Systems, in Czechia, Germany’s Blefa and Italy’s Supermonte Group, according to Tučník.
“For the Slovak market, we buy cans from Canpack, the strategic supplier of Prazdroj,” said Tučník. Aluminium plate used for Prazdroj cans sold on the Slovak market is processed in Canpack’s Brzesko plant, southern Poland – 150km from Asahi Group’s brewery in Veľký Šariš, Slovakia.
“In Slovakia there are currently neither capacities for production of metal suitable for beverage cans, nor capacities for production of cans themselves. The closest capacities are in Czechia and south Poland,” said Tučník.
Made in Slovakia
Crown is therefore the only significant beverage can maker with a facility in Slovakia. The company employs 170 staff in Kechnec but will have to face a new challenge in terms of retaining quality staff. Car maker, Volvo, is finishing a new plant for electric cars in eastern Slovakia, less than ten miles away from Kechnec.
“Hiring is already running and there is a certain pressure on wages as Volvo is very aggressive in terms of wage policy,” said Sokirka. Crown’s mechanics are an attractive hiring proposition – they have an engineering education, they are capable of basic machine maintenance, it takes 6-12 months to train them. And the company’s electricians are also able to repair machines, according to Sokirka.
The Kechnec plant has also had to cope with energy changes. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine caused an energy crisis, because supplies of Russian natural gas dried up, and the company decided to build an in house liquified petroleum gas (LPG) plant instead. Its mother company provided €400,000 ($433,000) for this investment, so that Kechnec could cope with a sudden loss of gas supplies. The company has in the meantime secured alternative non-Russian sources of gas, with the LPG station being an important backup.
Tatrakon, the largest canned food maker in Slovakia in Slovak hands, is also investing in these challenging times: “We purchased two new lines for production and packaging of products worth €2 million [$2.2 million] which will increase production and make it more efficient,” said Ľuboš Edelmüller, marketing advisor at Tatrakon. The first of the lines was put into operation in 2023 and the second will be launched in H1 2024.
Tatrakon produces on average 25 million products annually. Its portfolio includes around 120 lines, ranging from pâtés and spreads, including vegetarian items, to various pasta sauces processed through sterilisation. Tatrakon’s Morca-della is the most popular spaghetti sauce sold in Slovakia, made since communist times in 1985. About 60% of the food is packed in aluminium containers and the remaining 40% in steel galvanised plate.
Tatrakon estimates that it commands about 40% of the Slovak metal canned food market.
In terms of canned food processed through sterilisation, Tatrakon’s biggest competitor on the Slovak market is Norway’s Orkla, according to Edelmüller. But Orkla does not produce food cans made of steel and aluminium in Slovakia.
Tatrakon is currently not able to compete with other companies in terms of Europe-wide volume, therefore the Slovak-owned company focuses on its domestic local market. Up to 10% of the firm’s output is exported. Tatrakon employs about 90 people and in 2023 the company had a turnover of about €16 million ($17.3 million).
With Slovakia retaining a solid industrial base, its skills and experience should enable it to maintain a significant metal packaging sector going forward.
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