Supporting craft breweries

Twee.

Not necessarily the case, some will be individually barcoded within a box especially if it's independent beer which a lot of smaller restaurants do have.

Hospitality have two ways to operate -

Take away - deposit charged and consumer takes the can off site to consumer and return themselves

Dine in - deposit not charged as the can/bottle stays on site. However the cafe etc will be charged by their wholesaler and this is the Re-Turn guidance on that:

" If a deposit is charged, the consumer can take their container off site. If the deposit is not charged, then the business is responsible for collecting the containers and taking them to a Return Point Operator to reclaim their deposit."

L1011

Where's the exception for multipacks anyway? All I can find is derails on making sure they are all barcoded.

I am expecting pubs/cafes/etc that used can and plastic to go back to glass for soft drinks. Which will be expensive.

Hotblack Desiato

I wonder what will happen with the Polish fridge in my local Molloys.

Proper Polish Tyskie (not the Grolsch-brewed muck) and various brews little known in this country. Can't imagine most of them will be entering the scheme so I expect them to disappear 😧

Where's this thing about multipacks being exempted coming from? First I've heard of it and doesn't make any sense.

Twee.

It was sent in an email, I'll have a dig around the site tomorrow and see if I can find any uploaded guidance. It's just for the transition period.

squonk

Does the multipack thing mean that the likes of Kinnegsr/GBB etc can get arid this by shifting the web shops to provide “better value” by shrink wrapping say 4 cans of Rustbucket, calling it a multipack and selling it for 60c less than if you bought 4 individual cans? Actually the breweries I mentioned are technically doing this anyway as GBB sell slabs and Kinnegsr sell varying combos of beer packs that could openly be construed as a multipack? Would it be eight to put a sticker over the standard can label barcode and generate a separate code for your beer box?

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121627672#Comment_121627672

No, because it's not a long term exception

Blisterman

My understanding is that it's up to the importers to register and barcode the products. I assume it'll end up being like foreign products which have a sticker with English language ingredients and nutritional information.

Twee.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121627672#Comment_121627672

No it's only for un-barcoded cans in multipacks, as they can't be scanned by the return machines without a barcode.

Twee.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121627765#Comment_121627765

Yes the importer will be "first to place the item on the market" therefore they have responsibility to register. However there is a cost associated with placing cans on the market (1c per can), plus cost of the sticker and the cost of applying the sticker which might be off putting. Additionally barcodes need to be registered 6 weeks in advance of landing in the market and the product uploader does not let you select a market date earlier than this when you register the product, smaller brands may not work that far ahead with their importers. I suppose the importer could order, register and hold stock until the reg is approved.

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121627956#Comment_121627956

I am already seeing barcode reuse by Irish breweries, same barcode on different releases. While this is going to break other rules, and probably the scheme rules too, I could see this being used as a workaround

Twee.

Oh the retailers won't like that... Not at all! I've seen listings lost over cans scanning in as other products where a barcode was reused accidently.

TaurenDruid

And it'll make scanning the right beer into Untappd a pain! #FirstWorldProblems

Pen Rua

I was chatting to yer man at the off license, and it seems pretty bleak in terms of outlook for US / UK / non-Irish special beers, as we expect. Core ranges too from outside Ireland might be scoped back.

I know we'll adjust in time, it's just a bit lousy that the scheme may end up decimating the variety of beers we get in Ireland - hopefully just in the short term?

Has there been talk of such a deposit return scheme at an EU level? One logo, one deposit rate, one system?

L1011

Nobody would want to bring anything in right now anyway - release it to market with no sticker and it'll have a five month shelf life; can't (officially!) release it market for another two weeks with a sticker.

Blisterman

Is this the end of craft beer advent calendars with exclusive beers not available elsewhere?

Also, if customs intercept any packages to Ireland, will they refuse to release them without the barcodes?

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121633510#Comment_121633510

Bottles aren't in scope, that needs to be remembered.

"Nothing" - other than cost and time, which is clearly going to stop lots of people - to stop someone doing an advent calendar of specials to get them all registered either.

Customs have only semi recently even started offering to let people pay the duty on intercepts; they may just go back to automatic destruction.

BeerNut

I don't see how it would affect the advent calendars. You can still have exclusive beers as long as they have a barcode on them and the deposit on all the cans is added to the package price.

Twee.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121633342#Comment_121633342

At the very least an EU wide logo, there's only so much room on the label 😂

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121633639#Comment_121633639

You'll have to go to 440s by the time the UK, Portuguese etc ones come in

Pen Rua

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121633639#Comment_121633639

This is it - at work atm, so don't have a can handy (lol) but I feel like there's usually already two pant logos for Denmark and Sweden [??], plus a recycle logo, plus a no-drinking-during-pregnancy-logo. Now a Re-Turn logo needs to be added.

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121633660#Comment_121633660

Sweden and Norway normally, the Danish logo I've only seen in Denmark.

The Dutch Statiegeld logo turns up a fair bit too. Kinnegar cans have a French specific recycling logo (they don't have a deposit system, yet). US cans often have a list of states and their different deposits.

There's already different language rules in different countries so a lot of breweries have two or three different label sets that cover a few countries each.

crusd

How is it not possible for this system to use the barcode already on the product?

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121633702#Comment_121633702

Because there are years and years worth of cans/bottles without a deposit paid on them that have that barcode on them.

Blisterman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121633602#Comment_121633602

But they'd have to individually register, and presumably relabel each beer at whatever time and expense that would take for a very small batch of beers. I don't see how it could be cost effective unless they're selling thousands of the calendars.

TaurenDruid

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121633710#Comment_121633710

But nobody has years and years worth of cans/bottles stashed away in a lockup, in the hope that some day, any day now, the government would bring in a deposit return scheme and they'd be quids-in, able to rock up with a Hiace to their local Spar, depositing can after can...

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121635004#Comment_121635004

On another of the ten threads on here about this, there's someone who it appears does have a pile collected already as he's certain he can 'trick' the machines somehow. He can't.

I could probably find a hundred quids worth in the bushes near here (fecking college students), albeit there's only one hundred quids worth to be found.

BeerNut

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121634156#Comment_121634156

Why would they need to relabel a beer if it's exclusive to the calendar? It's just a very small run, with its own unique barcode. The cost of doing it would just be added to the price.

Blisterman

Because it costs 100 euro a barcode to register them. Plus an additional unspecified fee if the same being barcode is being used overseas.

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121635168#Comment_121635168

The 100/barcode was changed to a sliding fee based on volume for small producers/importers, its 500 a year for all your barcodes up to 750k containers, 1000 up to 1.5m

100/barcode and .0135 or .0312 for International barcodes depending on whether you're under or over 10m

https://re-turn.ie/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Producer-Fees-Updated-September-2023-2.pdf

Would a small scale importer do over 750k containers a year?

Citizen Six

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121635037#Comment_121635037

Copy a barcode, print, and apply to the can. Feed them into the machine. That would work, right?