SOLUTIONS FOR BEER
TO ENTER THE GREEK BEER MARKET,
OLYMPIC BREWERY ORDERS
ITS FIRST LINE FROM SIDEL
A particularly flexible line - in terms of both containers and speeds is ordered to relaunch a famous name in glass bottles and metal cans
The purely Greek,
Olympic Brewery is a
dynamically developing
company, founded in
January 2010, producing
FIX Hellas, the most
historic Greek beer and
FIX Dark, its second beer
sidel.com/beer
'Fix is back' ran the
advertising campaign
A history of regularly
acquiring Sidel equipment
Created in 1864 and renowned in
the 19th century, 'Fix Hellas' lager
disappeared from the shelves in the
1980s. Since May 2010, it has been
back on the market as a result of
Olympic Brewery purchasing a
particularly sophisticated Sidel line.
“We wanted a very flexible line,”
explained John Chitos, CEO of
Olympic Brewery, “to package the
beer in both metal cans and glass
bottles, with different formats.”
Other requirements were quick
delivery and start-up of the line with the possibility of gradually
increasing production speed.
The Chitos family and Sidel have a
history together. In 1984 the family
bought its first Sidel line for filling
carbonated drinks in glass bottles.
In 1994, the company purchased a
blow moulder to bottle its water in
plastic. Four years later, Chitos was
the very first company to choose the
then-new Combi, the integrated PET
blowing, filling and capping solution.
Since the success of Combi, the
leader in the Greek mineral water
market has regularly acquired Sidel
Combi equipment. Chitos SA now
has two water bottling plants and
seven production lines.
Maintaining quality in the long term
- in the face of tough opposition
John Chitos joined Elias and George Grekis at
Hellenic Microbreweries, located 70 km north of
Athens, and renamed it 'Olympic' Brewery. To
modernise the brewery, it is continuing to place its
trust in Sidel equipment. “Our challenge was to
put Fix back on the market, with its pleasant taste
and excellent quality. And, of course, to maintain
this quality over the longer term,” says John
Chitos. The goal was to gain market share (3 to
5%) from competition like giants Heineken and
Carlsberg, in a mature market with an annual
consumption of 5 million hectolitres (132 million
US gallons). Needless to say, this commitment
has been met.
HIGHLIGHTS

Design, delivery and installation of line
with three conveying levels

Filling machine

Washing and rinsing equipment

Palletising and depalletising equipment

Further addition of palletisers, pasteurisers
and conveying equipment
Less than nine months to first production of glass bottles and metal cans
Sidel needed less than nine months to design, deliver and install the line with three conveying levels,
and to produce the first market-ready 0.5 litre glass bottles and 0.33 litre cans. Composed of filling,
washing, rinsing, palletising and depalletising equipment, the line meets rigorous standards for
flexibility and reliability. It runs 12 hours a day, six days a week, with package and format
changeovers every two days - sometimes the same day - depending on market demand. Container
types are changed (returnable glass, non-returnable glass and cans), as are formats (0.33 and
0.5litre). Brands are even changed - the company not only selling 'Fix' but also a speciality organic
beer called 'B29'. Production rates, too, can be changed from 12,500 to 28,000 containers per hour.
“The results are up to our expectations,” says Christos Alexopoulos, Technical Director. Success is
such that Olympic wanted to increase production even more. A solution proposed by Sidel, which
included the purchase of palletisers, pasteurisers and conveying equipment, now enables Olympic to
run cans and glass at the same time.
The information in this document contains general descriptions of technical
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options available, which do not always have to be present in each individual case. The
required features should therefore be specified in each individual case at the time of
closing the contract. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the previous written approval
of Sidel. All intellectual property rights, including copyright, are reserved by Sidel.
www.sidel.com