Celebrating 15 Years of the SuperEnd®

At Crown, we pride ourselves on the fact that our many packaging innovations touch the lives of billions of people around the world every single day. We are always looking to improve our existing products as well as to pioneer new concepts with the goal of delivering innovation that responds directly to consumer needs and helps our customers build their brands. But as we keep our eyes on the future of innovation, it’s also important to look back at some of the packaging innovations that have changed the industry.

15 years of the SuperEnd®

This year, we celebrate the 15th anniversary of Crown’s revolutionary SuperEnd® beverage end. When we first introduced this beverage end technology, it actually marked the first major breakthrough in beverage end design in nearly 20 years.

Since the metal beverage can’s first introduction in the 1950s, the industry has always sought to make it as light as possible without compromising its strength. SuperEnd® beverage ends were designed to advance can quality and performance through improved seams and increased strength, all while using less metal. The new ends reduce aluminum use by 10% and feature a unique geometry that provided increased panel strength, making them more buckle resistant than standard ends without any reduction in integrity during pasteurization, shipping, and handling.

More Room to Spread Your Message

SuperEnd® beverage ends also feature a distinctive message or "billboard" area. Marketers can print brand logos, special messages and co-branding promotions, instant win campaigns or communicate with consumers about issues such as recycling.

Following their launch in North America, the new beverage ends were made available in Europe in early 2003, enabling European beverage producers to see similar benefits.

SuperEnd® Means Super Sustainability

To date, more than 450 billion SuperEnd® beverage ends have been produced by Crown and its licensees, saving over 117,000 metric tons of aluminum, 2,000 metric tons of coatings, 900,000 metric tons of greenhouse gases and 2.35 million barrels of oil. That’s quite an achievement for 15 years!

Learn more about Crown’s innovation process.