From manufacturing to customer, Arca Continental Coca-Cola Southwest Beverages (AC-CCSWB) aspires to a simple goal; incorporate sustainability into every action it takes.
CCSWB serves Coca-Cola brands throughout Texas and portions of New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Arkansas, making it one of the largest Coca-Cola bottlers in the United States. The company’s unwavering dedication to environmental stewardship has developed purposeful changes in its packaging materials, water supply, energy usage, and recycling efforts. Across a reduced carbon footprint, enhanced recycling initiatives, and replenished watersheds, CCSWB dedicates itself to nurturing a sustainable future.
How Coca-Cola Southwest Beverages Is Stewarding a Sustainable Future
By StoryStudio on April 29, 2024
SPONSORED BY
World Without Waste
Back in 2021, CCSWB enacted plans to reduce the company’s use of new plastic, doubling the application of recycled content across its entire plastic packaging portfolio. The local Coca-Cola bottler proudly concluded the year with each new plastic bottle containing 50% recycled polyethylene terephthalate (or rPET). In addition, CCSWB implemented new 13.2-oz 100% rPET bottles across their featured Coca-Cola Trademark brands. Consistent in their efforts, the company followed up in 2022 with 20-oz 100% rPET bottles for Coca-Cola Trademark brands and DASANI.
Along with internal tweaking, CCSWB actively seeks to make a public difference through ongoing volunteerism, local donations, and recycling awareness. During the 2023 NCAA Men and Women’s Final Four Tournaments this past year, the company encouraged recycling at the American Airlines Center (AAC) and NRG Stadium. In Dallas, CCSWB was able to implement 12 SmartSort units at the AAC that used artificial intelligence to categorize discarded items by recyclability. Today, the AAC now has over 21 Smart Sort units across the venue. Whether providing education centers and supplementary bins at festivals, promoting recycling at local events, or motivating participation with free merchandise at Sip and Sounds, CCSWB is leading sustainable practices within the community and beyond.
Freshwater Conservation
Besides packaging, CCSWB drives positive change through its water conservation methods. The company has embraced innovative freshwater and agricultural initiatives through partnerships to support areas that provide a replenishing water source to its facilities. In 2020, CCSWB and The Coca-Cola Foundation supported The Nature Conservancy’s efforts by pledging $2 million to meet water needs across the region. This cooperative impact spotlighted a statewide ad campaign about the strain on freshwater resources, as well as uplifted conservation both in CCSWB’s plants and local community.
Like many of the Coca-Cola bottlers across the country, CCSWB donates empty ingredient barrels to local nonprofits for storage tanks. Events like EarthX in Fort Worth use these barrels to help collect rainwater for recycling and reuse. Since 2013, CCSWB has donated over 3,000 barrels to potentially save more than 3.4 million gallons of water per year, resulting in the company’s largest active partnership.
Sustaining, Together
Since 2020, CCSWB has reduced its carbon emissions by 46 million pounds and decreased annual plastic waste by 78 million pounds. The company’s enthusiasm for sustainability, not only in its production but community, shows no sign of slowing down in the coming years. With its local partnerships, CCSWB recognizes the power of cooperation, such as with the City of McAllen and the Keep McAllen Beautiful group, which promoted recycling efforts, resulting in the collection of over 24 million plastic bottles. CCSWB understands that to make a tangible difference in the world, it must be the first to act. And to make lasting, meaningful, long-term change, we must do so together!
For more information regarding CCSWB sustainability, communities, and partnerships, visit: cocacolaswb.com.
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Our plastic problem is a global crisis, and it will only get worse without action. Enter the Coca-Cola Company’s World Without Waste initiative, which is a sustainability program close to CCSWB’s heart. Launched in 2018, this ambitious packaging program is a beverage industry goal to collect and recycle the equivalent of every bottle, or can, sold globally by 2030. Additional goals include 100% of packaging being recyclable by 2025 andusing 50% recycled material in packaging by 2030.
The company understands this earth currently faces a packaging problem, and it has a responsibility to help solve that issue. CCSWB’s dedication to the World Without Waste initiative is a testament to the sustainable change it wishes to achieve, and the lengths the company will go through to make it a reality.
“We have an unwavering commitment to sustainability, and it guides everything we do as a company,” said Abraham Tueme, Director of Sustainability, Coca-Cola Southwest Beverages. “From promoting water conservation within our production facilities and our associates, to integrating recycled material in our plastic bottles, and promoting local volunteerism and donations to local organizations, we place a high priority on our sustainability efforts.”
Recyclable Packaging
We have an unwavering commitment to sustainability, and it guides everything we do as a company.”
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Abraham Tueme,
Director of Sustainability, Coca-Cola Southwest Beverages
Renewable Energy
While sustainability is certainly about the usage of clean, recyclable materials, it also extends to the energy powering company facilities. Across all Texas-based deregulated locations, CCSWB purchases 100% renewable energy, making it the first long-term energy contract of this size among Coca-Cola bottlers in North America. Northpoint, the company’s newest Houston-based facility, is also 100% powered by renewable energy. Plus, since opening in 2020, the location has reduced the energy requirement for manufacturing operations by 8%.
