behind that 'simple' can
The technology
The can as a form of packaging. It's an 'ordinary', no frills product and you'd
think there would he little to report about it. But behind that simple product
lies a whole world of technological ingenuity.
A flawless sheet of tinplate is
unrolled and moves into a huge
machine. Every second that
machine punches up to ten 'cups' -
each barely five centimetres high -
from the sheet. That is the beginning
of the can and up to that moment the
whole process can still easily be follo
wed with the naked eye. But, imme
diately after that, the production pro
cess shifts into top gear, with the cans-
in-the-making zooming past you in all
directions. Each time in a slightly dif
ferent, more definitive form.
Continental
One of Heineken's leading sup
pliers of cans is Continental Can
Europe (CCE). The annual output of
Continental Can Europe is staggering
ly high. CCE's seven European plants
produce as many as eight billion cans,
from small (15 cl) to large (50 cl)
sizes, whilst the total cans market in
Europe fluctuates between 24 and 25
billion cans.
Heineken cans for the Dutch mar
ket are produced in Lint, a village on
the outskirts of Antwerp, Belgium.
Production capacity for beverage cans
at the Lint factory runs to some 900
million a year. In Lint they also manu
facture some 500 million cans for pro
cessed food and as many as 700 mil
lion battery jackets.
The CCE plant near Dunkirk,
France, which came on stream two
years ago, produces only beverage
cans and has a capacity of 1.5 billion
'units' per year. The products manu
factured in Dunkirk include the
Heineken cans for the French market
and for a number of Heineken export
markets.
'Wall-ironing'
Developments in the can-making
industry move fast. 'In 1980 we open
ed here in Lint. Over the past twelve
years we've been able to achieve
major improvements in reliability,
speed and inspection techniques', says
Mr Hermans, general manager manu
facturing for the Netherlands,
Belgium and France.
The technology of can manufactu
ring may have outgrown its simple
beginnings but there are still plenty of
challenges for the can specialists. One
example: the sheet from which the
cups are punched is currently still
0.29 of a millimetre thick. Continental
