Drinks firm moves into €27m factory

After almost 30 years in its crammed Qormi site, General Soft Drinks has moved to Marsa into a shiny new factory that cost €27 million.

Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi yesterday visited the high-tech plant, which was commended for best practice in its design by Coca Cola company. The L-shaped building covers 21,000 square metres of a total of 33,000 square metres.

The project was completed in just two years - a record time.

All the 260 employees have been kept on but some had to be retrained since the new production process needs fewer people to man.

Describing it as a success story, Dr Gonzi said the Mizzi family took a decision to invest in its people and now produced a high-level product.

"As long as we continue investing and removing mediocrity, the country will move ahead," he said.

The country should never be afraid of change and reform, Dr Gonzi added. The new plant incorporates a warehouse - 18 metres high with an area of 4,500 square metres, with soft drinks stacked seven pallets high adding up to a total of 7,200 pallets.

Spanning from one side of the warehouse, without any supporting columns, are metal beams 35 metres long that weigh around 62 tonnes in all.

The pallets are made of recycled plastic crates that used to hold the glass bottled soft drinks.

There are two main bottling and packaging plants - one for soft drinks which has a capacity of 24,000 litres an hour while the bottled water plant has a capacity of 18,000 litres an hour.