Diet for a Six Pack

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Six pack rings or six pack yokes are plastic rings that are used in shipping and packaging of beverage six packs, usually for aluminum cans of soft drinks and beer.

• 1 History
• 2 Repackaging
• 3 Environmental concerns
• 4 In pop culture
• 5 References

[edit] History

The six pack rings in most common use today are the descendants of an original design by ITW Hi-Cone, which first introduced them in St. Louis, Missouri in the summer of 1960.[1] Within 10 years, plastic rings had completely replaced the paper and metal based holders then common in the market.[1] Today several other manufacturers continue to produce six pack rings.

[edit] Repackaging

Although the six-pack is not nearly as popular as it once was, the demand for six-pack carriers may continue indefinitely and is supported, at least in part, by an active secondary market for repackaging by retailers. The repackaging trend began in 1983 when multi-pack carriers were made available to the retail community by MPI, a company owned by Nancy Mumm.

MPI developed a domestic and international market by widely promoting the advantages of manual repackaging programs. These programs were based on the principle that if retailers would severely trim their inventory SKUs, follow a highly efficient purchasing method based exclusively on the lowest cost per can and start an in-house repackaging operation using under-utilized employees then the result would be increased profits and productivity with lower priced products across the multipack spectrum. Given new and easy access to low cost carriers in small quantities, retailers finally gained independence from the tightly structured sales programs being offered by wholesale distributors which often seemed to be designed to boost gallonage sales and/or profits for the manufacturer rather than promoting retail competition and lower prices to the consumer. When a carrier is applied correctly the package is of identical quality to those produced by a brewer or soda canner.

The business was sold to Illinois Tool Works in January, 2004 and today remains one of many six-pack ring repackaging distributors operating in the U.S.

[edit] Environmental concerns

Since the late 1970s[2], six pack rings have been cited as a particularly dangerous form of marine litter. Marine wildlife have been found entangled in the rings and unable to free themselves, sometimes strangling to death.[3][4] The instruction to cut apart the rings before disposal has been a popular one from environmentalists, promoted as a simple way that consumers can help alleviate the problem.

However, six-pack rings are a relatively minor contributor to marine litter and wildlife fatalities. Fishing gear and other plastic wastes are a larger problem. Six Pack carrier rings are made to photo-degrade within 90 days of being littered. This is in accordance with the U.S. Federal standard for testing plastic photo-degradation, which is 40 CFR Ch. I (7–1–03 Edition)PART 238 [5]

[edit] In pop culture

• Obsoletely Fabulous, an episode of the animated television series Futurama features six ducks trapped in the same six pack ring, who are then mistaken for beer cans by the robot Bender.
• The 2006 animated film Happy Feet features a penguin whose head is trapped in a six pack ring.
• In the Simpsons episode The Old Man and the Lisa Montgomery Burns attaches millions of 'recycled' six-pack holders together into a net, which he uses to catch tons of sea life and make “Lil' Lisa Slurry”.

[edit] References

1. ^ a b Hi-Cone History
2. ^ The Straight Dope: Should you cut up six-pack rings so they don't choke sea birds?
3. ^ Six pack rings hazard to wildlife
4. ^ Louisiana Fisheries – Fact Sheets
5. ^ http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/cfr_2003/julqtr/pdf/40cfr233.71.pdf, 40 CFR Ch I.