Ball Corporation, which supplies cans to the drinks giant, admitted that a temporary employee was dismissed after they were found to have breached its hygiene processes. It said the incident took place on the evening of Wednesday, 28 February.
Coca-Cola Great Britain responded, claiming it was an “isolated incident” and it was confident that Ball acted quickly to resolve the matter.
Robust hygiene
“This is an isolated incident which took place at our external can manufacturing supplier, Ball, which is a separate facility to our factory. We are confident that Ball has robust hygiene procedures in place, and they acted swiftly and appropriately in dealing with this matter,” said a spokesman for Coca-Cola.
“We are assured that the single empty can has been discarded, and that there was no impact at all to any other packs or production lines at the Ball facility.”
A spokeswoman for Ball Corporation said: “A temporary employee was found to have breached our hygiene processes and was dismissed from the company. We can also confirm that only one can was affected, and that the affected can was not on our production line.”
Quality tests
The company said that it took quality of its products “extremely seriously”.
“We submit our cans to stringent hygiene and quality tests before sending them to our customers. Our internal processes ensured that this incident was identified promptly and appropriate action taken,” the spokeswoman added.
Coca-Cola European Partners (CCEP) recently revealed that it was looking to close two sites in 2019, which would affect 288 jobs, including its Milton Keynes factory and a distribution centre in Northampton. CCEP’s site in Milton Keynes is responsible for one-third of its canned output.
Ball Corporation admitted that Coca-Cola was one of its customers, but has revealed that “at this stage” this would not impact its operations.