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The Milk Bottle Supply Situation*

J . W . Sa y b o l t Glass Container Manufacturers’ Institute, New York, N. Y.

our secretary has suggested that I tion, in other words, milk bottle manu­ Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/jfp/article-pdf/10/2/114/2393776/0022-2747_10_2_114.pdf by guest on 25 September 2021 Y talk to you on a subject vital at facturers must supply the normal this time to the whole dairy industry— grossage for replacements and in addi­ the milk suppliers, distributors and tion approximately eight times the customers, as well as yourselves. The unit value of the increase. subject is the present supply situation For the five years preceding 1941 with regard to milk bottles. the milk bottle industry shipped an an­ Normally, such a subject would not nual average of slightly under 2τ/ί mil­ have sufficient . news interest to be lion gross a year. In 1941, with the worth while as a topic. Even during boom in war industries and the begin­ the tremendous supply dislocations of ning of concentrations of men in train­ the war, it might have been taken for ing camps, shipments suddenly jumped granted that the milk bottle supply 30 percent to million gross. In the would be adequate. In view of the following year they increased further difficulties and the unprecedented de­ to 3yi million gross. After that they mands on the glass container industry steadily declined for two years. This in the last six years, I feel that the milk slackening in the requirement oc­ bottle manufacturers have every reason curred mainly for these reasons. The to be proud of their record of service “float” of bottles—that is, the eight to the dairy industry. No other indus­ required to service each unit delivered try has been as fully and as steadily —had temporarily caught up with the supplied with glass containers as the increases in milk consumption wher­ dairy industry. ever those increases had taken place. At the present time, with milk bottle Men were moving rapidly overseas and manufacturers operating at full capa­ others were being taken from cities city, the supply may be described as and villages into training camps al­ “tight”, and even critical. Only in ready well supplied with bottles. one area is there a serious shortage of Moreover, in the fall of 1942 limitation containers and there, it is generally orders were issued by WPB—Order admitted, other factors are at work be­ No. 10 requiring a deposit on all yond the responsibility of the milk bottles—and Order No. 79 restricting bottle suppliers. the distribution of cream and limiting Before analyzing the present supply the amount of fluid milk that could be outlook for milk bottles in detail, let me sold in areas of 50,000 population or review briefly the record since 1940. more. The deposit order stimulated Some of our experiences in this period the return of bottles with the result serve as an instructive background for that dairies generally were securing the current situation. Bear in mind greater trippage from their bottles. that the milk bottle industry must be Late in 1944 the demand for maxi­ prepared to deliver a considerable nor­ mum milk bottle production reap­ mal annual volume of containers for peared and has remained ever since. replacement, and that when an increase During 1944 the dairy industry could in milk consumption develops, ap­ have had a half million more gross if proximately eight bottles are required it had asked for them. While the initially to service each unit delivered. glass industry foresaw the later de­ In periods of increasing milk consump­ mand and made timely preparations, it J ournal of M ilk and F ood T echnology 115 could not have laid by a stock of any so that each industry receives its share, considerable size because the clamor but the supply is limited. for other types of bottles was too great, A further curtailment in soda ash if for no other reason. Since the late supply has recently resulted from the months of 1944, milk bottle manufac­ opening of new aluminum manufactur­ turers have operated their machines as ing facilities, and it is probable that our fully as the supply of raw materials industry will not be able to maintain

would let them. its present rate of production. Since Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/jfp/article-pdf/10/2/114/2393776/0022-2747_10_2_114.pdf by guest on 25 September 2021 As a result of their efforts, ship­ soda ash production requires elaborate ments of milk bottles for the first eight and expensive processes, it is not likely months of 1946 are 60.5 per cent that this situation will clear up for at greater than for the first eight months least another year. of 1940. They are nearly 9 percent Further, the shortage of box cars ahead of even the similar period of has had the effect of holding down 1945. shipments. Earlier in the year, the coal The continued rapid increase in milk and railroad strikes handicapped our consumption is one reason for the performance. In view of these difficul­ “tight” supply of milk bottles. The ties, our 60.5 percent increase in ship­ return of our military forces, the large ments as compared with 1940 is an number of new households, the short­ achievement. ages of other foods, and similar factors With these production problems have combined to create a continuously making the supply of milk bottles rising demand for milk. The increase critical throughout the country, in the has been so rapid that the “float” of New York City metropolitan area the bottles has had no opportunity to situation is especially so, and there, as quite catch up to milk distributors’ re­ in other areas, the milk bottle manufac­ quirements. Once the “float” is ade­ turers have been absolved. A recent quate, the situation is eased; the milk survey of urban milk markets showed bottle, being a multiple-trip container, that elsewhere, while additional milk needs only to be replaced after its bottle supplies could be used to advan­ service life of thirty or forty trips or tage, the continued rise in milk dis­ more. tribution was not being impaired to But an increase in business volume any great extent. is as much a goal of the dairy industry Another subject your Secretary ex­ as of the glass industry. The dairy­ pressed interest in is—future trends in man wants to know why the glass the design of milk bottles. As to this bottle has trouble in keeping his pace. matter, I can say emphatically that the If the supply of milk bottles is some­ square design, development of which thing less than could be desired, the started prior to the war, has proven to causes lie beyond the power of the glass be the ideal dairy container. While industry to correct. In the first place, improvement in glass manufacturing there is a serious shortage of soda ash, technic may result in still further im­ one of the requisite raw materials for proved designing, the square bottle is glass. Authorities estimate that soda here to stay. ash production this year will be about It should be pointed out here that the 10 percent, or 500,000 tons, short of extent that this new bottle has been expected demand. There is no total, introduced into use, has been a factor reasonable substitute for soda ash in in increasing the milk bottle supply. making glass; and, unfortunately, Since there is no individual blown let­ there is no substitute for soda ash in tering on these bottles, they can be making aluminum, soap, paper, cleans­ turned out in long production runs; ers, detergents, and hundreds of other and the inventory problem, often a products. We are all on a quota basis, complex one with round, blown- 116 M il k B ottle S upply lettered bottles, is simplified. Still an­ splashing action and therefore the other advantage must thus be scored to effectiveness of the cleansing. the credit of the square type of bottle, To resolve all doubt, Professors which the glass industry, and that part Burgwald and Armstrong took batches of the dairy industry which has of a dozen square and a dozen round adopted it, are confident will be the bottles at intervals from seven types milk bottle of the future. of washers in use in an average size

Those dairies which have adopted city. Following standard testing pro­ Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/jfp/article-pdf/10/2/114/2393776/0022-2747_10_2_114.pdf by guest on 25 September 2021 the new bottle are obtaining the cedures, bacteria counts were made for economies predicted for it. Indeed, each of nearly a thousand bottles, half wherever it has been possible to install of them square and half of them round, the new design, the saving it has brought to the laboratory over a period effected in greater utilization of equip­ of three months. Their conclusion was ment and storage and delivery space that “there is no difference in the com­ has been as important as the overall mercial practicability of cleansing and economy of approximately Ιφ per de­ sterilizing the returnable square milk livered unit resulting from its use. bottle and the conventional round Since a case of round bottles takes up bottle in the typical dairy soaker equip­ 47 Yi percent more area than a case of ment”. squares, a dairy can do almost half I have attempted in this short talk to again as much business with the same acquaint you with the facts of the cur­ storage and cooler space. Moreover, rent milk bottle supply situation... In the space-saving feature is a tremen­ spite of shortages of soda ash and dous advantage in the delivery opera­ other materials and services, the glass tion, and becomes a very important container industry is now producing at factor in the loads carried on every- a rate 60 percent greater than it was in other-day deliveries. The carrying 1940, but it is doubtful if this rate can capacity of present-day trucks can be be maintained under present conditions. increased with very minor adjustments Where container shortages threaten by as much as 50 percent. The storage to become more acute experience advantage of square bottles is also of proves that dairymen have a means for importance to the consumer, especially helping themselves. In many such when she is served by every-other-day markets campaigns urging consumers deliveries. to return their bottles promptly have As milk sanitarians, you will be'in­ been instituted with excellent results. terested in a cleansing test on square To achieve the best results such cam­ bottles performed under average dairy paigns should cover the entire market conditions by Professors L. H. Burg- with all units cooperating. That real wald and T. V. Armstrong of Ohio possibilities for greater utilization of State University. Since the square the glass milk bottle exist in many design is new, some doubt arose in markets is indicated by the contrast in the minds of a few dairymen lest it trippage figures. would not wash as easily and thor­ Glass milk bottle manufacturers have accepted as a responsibility the oughly as the old round bottle. furnishing of these containers for the Actually, the inner corners of the great mass of consumers, and will con­ square design have curving radii, so tinue, as in the past, to give their best that it approximates the interior of the in design and production to this ob­ round bottle; moreover, it was antici­ jective, but it should be realized that pated by the designers of the square the present conditions, outlined above, bottle that the flattened panels would are real handicaps and that every rea­ act as a baffle in the washing process, sonable cooperation from the dairies breaking up the swirl, increasing the and the public is needed.