Costa Coffee chooses the eye-catching and Starpack award winning new drinks carrier from PortaDrink™.

Coffee take-away sales are a crucial part of the business in the 480 Costa Coffee cafés in the UK. Up until December 2005 they were using grey pulp board moulded trays. Boring and space-inefficient! The challenge they faced was to find an alternative multi-cup carrier, which had to be cost effective, eye-catching, safe, user-friendly, space efficient and environmentally sustainable. Perhaps most important of all was the branding possibilities. Is there any better form of advertising than people on the streets carrying coffee in carriers, prominently displaying your own brand identity?

The answer was PortaDrink™ from PortaBrands, innovators in carrying solutions. “We are very pragmatic and one of the cornerstones in our business idea is the understanding of our customers’ functional needs,” says Ian Bates, Inventor and CEO of PortaBrands.  “We can provide a way of speeding up bar/café service by up to 25%, and in this case, where the previous alternative was pulp moulded trays, we could offer double the space utilisation”.

“When it comes to coffee, you buy as much as you need there and then. But when it comes to selling wine, people tend to buy what they can carry. For this sector we have other carrying solutions that offer retailers increased sales potential. It is also important that the consumer can easily flatten the carrier after use for storage before recycling.”

Korsnäs board for strength and environment
Another cornerstone in the business idea is the use of cartonboard from chain of custody managed forests. This means that the raw material is sourced in an environmentally responsible and sustainable manner. “Here – and in many other solutions – we use Frövi Carry*. The board is light, strong and offers excellent wet and tear strength properties – vital for safe and sturdy hot drinks carriers. We have a long-standing experience of Korsnäs board. Our policy and their board go hand-in-hand,” says Mr Bates.

PortaDrink™ is a one-handed carrier, designed for 2, 3 or 4 cups. They are sheet-fed litho or reel-fed flexo printed in up to 6 colours. Printing and converting takes place in Belfast and Manchester under licence by The MSO Group.