An 80-year-old British factory producing two of the country’s best-known drinks is being backed by a major programme of investment in UK manufacturing, agriculture and supply chains.
Suntory Beverage & Food GB&I, the company behind Lucozade and Ribena, is investing £57.5 million across its British supply chain, including a new £25 million high-speed manufacturing line at its historic factory in Coleford, Gloucestershire.
The investment comes in the 80th anniversary year of the Coleford factory, which was built in 1946 and remains at the heart of the company’s British manufacturing operation.
Known as “Apollo 5”, the new production line is due to become operational in 2027, when Lucozade will celebrate its 100th anniversary.
It will replace two older Ribena production lines and will be capable of producing both Lucozade and Ribena, allowing the factory to switch rapidly between the two brands.
Once operational, it will be capable of producing around 55,000 bottles every hour.
The new equipment will use aseptic technology, with heat and pressurised air used during the bottle-cleaning process, as the company seeks to improve efficiency while reducing the amount of energy and water required in production.
The investment forms part of a wider programme to modernise the Coleford site and strengthen its long-term future as a major British manufacturing facility.
Suntory Beverage & Food GB&I chief operating officer Elise Seibold said when the plans were announced that the company was investing in the factory to strengthen the future of Lucozade and Ribena.
She said the project also demonstrated the company’s commitment to the Forest of Dean and its role in the regional economy.
But the investment stretches well beyond the factory gates.
A further £14.5 million is being invested in a new blackcurrant processing facility at Ledbury in Herefordshire, in partnership with Döhler Group’s Bevisol Ltd.
The facility opened in time to handle this year’s British blackcurrant harvest and will prepare fruit grown by Suntory’s network of 33 farms across five UK growing regions.
Those farms produce approximately 10,500 tonnes of blackcurrants during an annual harvest lasting just six weeks.
The new Ledbury operation includes automated weighing and handling equipment, modern filtration technology and digital tracking of fruit bins as they move through the supply chain.
It is also supporting employment in the region, with 12 new full-time positions and another 30 seasonal jobs.
For Ribena, the connection with British farming goes back generations.
The drink was created in 1938 and continues to be made using British-grown blackcurrants. Around 90 per cent of Britain’s blackcurrant crop is used to make Ribena.
The company has also invested in research aimed at protecting the future of British blackcurrant growing, including a long-running breeding programme with Scotland’s James Hutton Institute to develop varieties better able to cope with changing weather conditions.
Meanwhile, the Coleford factory remains a sizeable British manufacturing operation.
The Gloucestershire site produces hundreds of millions of drinks each year, with the company’s wider British and Irish business employing hundreds of people.
The latest investments bring together an unusual chain of British industry: fruit grown on British farms, processed in Herefordshire and used in drinks manufactured at an 80-year-old Gloucestershire factory.
And while the company behind the investment is ultimately owned by Japan’s Suntory group, the money is being spent on manufacturing capacity, agricultural processing, jobs and supply chains here in Britain.
Eight decades after the Coleford factory was built, the investment is intended to ensure Lucozade and Ribena continue rolling off British production lines for many years to come.
