Yes we can: Czech breweries turn to tinned sales
Czech beer consumers are growing increasingly fond of canned beer. While in 2015, canned beer sales went up by 16 percent on the previous year, last year the sales went up by no less than a quarter, the daily e15 reported this week, citing data from the Czech Beer and Malt Association.
Despite its slightly higher price, the share of canned beer on the Czech beer market reached seven percent, which is an increase by two percentage points on the previous year. While that amount still accounts for only a fraction of overall beer sales, brewery owners expect to see demand for canned beer grow further in the future and gradually follow the same pattern as in other European states.
At the same time, sales of beer packaged in other containers, that is bottles, kegs and plastic bottles, registered a slight drop last year. The sale of beer in glass bottles currently accounts for 41 percent of the market, while beer in kegs has a 37 percent share on the market and beer in plastic bottles accounts for 12 percent.
The growing interest in canned beer has recently driven some breweries into substantial investments, the daily e15 writes. The central Bohemian Krušovice brewery, owned by Dutch group Heineken, and the Prague-based Stropramen brewery last year invested around 100 million crowns each into new packaging lines for canned beer. In 2015, Staropramen registered an increase in canned beer sales by one fifth on the previous year.
The Nymburk brewery recently invested 50 million crowns into a new filling line, which is the biggest investment in its history. In 2014, the brewery registered a 34 percent increase in canned beer sales and last year it was similar. Plzeňský Prazdroj brewery is also considering purchasing a new filling line.
