Cerveja Só

Industrial Design • Material Development • Packaging Design
3D Modeling • Branding • Circular Economy

Industrial Design • Material Development • Packaging Design •
3D Modeling • Branding • Circular Economy

Cerveja Só is a project focused on the development of two new materials: a paper and a fibreboard made of the organic matter obtained from the process of beer craft.

To achieve the final composition of the materials, a partnership with the Chemistry department of PUC-Rio was stablished. The “beer paper” is a 100% made of wet brewers grains, which means that there is no addition of recycled or virgin paper in the production of it. For the fibreboard, the grains were mixed with resin, after being roasted, resulting in a resistant product.

With the intention to display an application of use of the developed materials, a packaging for commercialising special editions of beers was designed.

Brewers grains are the solid residue left after the processing of germinated and dried cereal grains for the production of beer. In the brewing process, grains are soaked in water until they germinate and then dried to produce the malt (malting). The malted grains are milled and steeped in hot water so that enzymes transform the starch into sugars. The resulting sugar-rich liquid is then boiled, filtered and fermented to produce beer. Brewers grains are collected at the end of the mashing process, once all sugars have been removed from the grain.

Each 100 litres of beer produced generates approximately 20 kg of wet brewers grains as waste, that represents about 85% of the total of brewery by-products.

‍Problem:
‍
Wet brewers grains contain 75-80% water and deteriorate rapidly due to the growth of bacteria, yeasts and fungi, being a highly perishable and bulky product that is costly to transport. For this reason, their distribution needs to be limited to a radius of 150-350 km around the brewery.

Dehydration facilitates the distribution of brewers grains beyond their area of production, however, this process demands a high energy cost. Lastly, fresh brewers grains left on the ground outside the brewery spoil quickly and can become an environmental nuisance, including water pollution.

The remaining product is usually discarded by the brewery by the end of the production process or is used for other purposes, such as animal feeding, because of its concentration of proteins and fibre.

In order to confirm the researched information and better understand about the process of beer production, a visit was paid to the Allegra Brewery in Rio de Janeiro.

Opportunity:

There isnt any effective practice of reuse of this material focused on the Craft Beer Industry Market.

Thus, Cerveja Só's goal is to make use of this residual matter in order to benefit the cycle: from the brewery to the end consumer. By doing so, the aim is to create a new experience of consumption that brings the beer appreciator closer to the beverage's fabrication process.

Finally, the idea of reusing part of the packaging for further purposes, such as serving snacks, extends the products lifecycle, representing a reduction in the environmental impact its discard could bring.

Cerveja Só's business model would follow a B2B logistics, this means that the target public would be the Craft Beer retailers in Rio de Janeiro. A third party company would be responsible for the production and distribution of the beer packaging and Cerveja Sós role as a company would be to manage the supply chain of its products as a whole, from obtaining the residual organic matter from the Breweries to promoting and selling the final product. Cerveja Sós website would be the main channel of direct communication with the company. By using the newsletter and free samples service, the company would be able to promote its brand, portray its vision and offer a showcase of its product, so that it could expand the portfolio of clients.