Sel has won many awards over the years for its innovative approach to pet bottle design but two prestigious international awards in a month is a first.

07/10/2013

Both awards were for Sidel's design work on a new bottle forSociété des Eaux d'Aix-les-Bains (SEAB), one of France's leadingproducers of bottled mineral water. The bottle marked a number ofdesign firsts in the bottled water market as the only triangularmineral water bottle produced in PET and the only one without aconventional label.

The first award was presented at the Beverage Innovation Awardson 19 September 2013 during the Drinktec international tradeexhibition in Munich, Germany, where Sidel was declared the winnerof the 'Best bottle in PET' category.  The annual BeverageInnovation Awards is now in its tenth year and returned to Drinktecin 2013 to reward and acknowledge excellence in beverage products,packaging, marketing and sustainability.  More than 370entries were received from 40 countries, illustrating the trulyglobal reach of the event.  The breadth of the awards is alsohighlighted by its 29 categories, with Sidel winning the hotlycontested Best Bottle in PET.

Less than two days later, Sidel once again proved victorious,this time at the Pentawards on 21 September 2013, with the samebottle taking Bronze in the Beverages category at a gala ceremonyat the W Hotel in Barcelona, Spain.

The Pentawards is a prestigious, worldwide competitionexclusively devoted to packaging design in all its forms, withentries received from around the globe and a truly internationaljudging panel.

Sidel has won a string of Pentawards for its packaging designexpertise, starting back in 2008, when it received a bronze awardfor its NoBottle™ lightweight 500 ml water bottle.  Then in2009 it won another bronze for its flame-like PET beer bottle,followed by a silver in 2012 for DailyDose^TM, aninnovative multipack made up of six assorted bottles reminiscent offruit slices.  This year the judges recognised Sidel'sparticularly innovative approach in developing the new SEABbottle.

Close collaboration

SEAB worked very closely with Sidel's in-house design team tocreate a bottle that would stand out in the French hospitalitysector.  Its triangular shape is itself a distinctivestatement, as is the decision not to adopt a conventional labellingapproach but rather to engrave the logo and product statutoryinformation directly onto the mould using a laser machine. This helps give the appearance that the bottle is glass rather thanPET, recognising that French cafes, restaurants and hotelstraditionally serve water in glass bottles and carafes.

General Manager of SEAB, Philippe Germaneau, says: "Ourobjective was to ensure the promotion of the Aix-les-Bains brandimage.  We needed to bring different and innovative productsto consumers within the hospitality sector.  In addition, wewanted to develop a competitive advantage through packaging whichwas more respectful of the environment."

Stylish yet functional

Judges at both the Pentawards and the Beverage Innovation Awardswere impressed by the high-quality look and feel of the SEABbottle, although functionality is also an important considerationin the judging criteria and the Sidel design scored highly in thisrespect also.  The triangular format proved particularlychallenging in terms of stability, with the bottom of the bottleextremely small in comparison to its body.

Despite the relatively small base, the required stability wasstill achieved, meeting the practical and functional requirementsof the brief in a design which is truly stylish andeye-catching.  Vice President for Packaging & Tooling atSidel, Vincent Le Guen, commented: "The Pentawards and the BeverageInnovation Awards are an excellent opportunity to see the latestdevelopments and trends in packaging design, and to put our owndesign expertise under the scrutiny of some very experiencedjudges.  We are obviously delighted that the creativity of ourin-house packaging design department has once again beenrecognised.  SEAB has also received very positive feedbackfrom its customers, which we are equally delighted with."

"When it comes to Sidel, we really appreciated the strongcommitment and interest from the company's team, right from thestart of talks," added SEAB's Philippe Germaneau.  "Sidel'spackaging design and process expertise was vital for us to producesuch a successful end-result."

Sidel has over 50 years of design expertise, with an in-houseteam that works with beverage producers around the world,responsible for 450 new concepts and some 5,000 bottle drawingsevery year.  More information is available at www.sidel.com/packaging. 

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