Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Our trip of the Coca-Cola factory.....


23rd November- Today, we took a trip to the Coca-Cola production plant in Sao Paulo, one of the biggest in the world. After a journey of about 1.5 hours, we reached there. The first sight that I witnessed was of huge trucks loading vans loading and unloading crates of Coca-Cola. We were taken to a room by our guide, a nice guy who immediately started introducing the company. We learnt that Coca-Cola was partners with FEMSA, a Mexican company that packed and sold beverages. We were, then given a presentation regarding the history of the company and other interesting facts about Coca-Cola were revealed (during which, obviously, we enjoyed Coke cans) . We watched the presentation, for about 15 to 20 minutes during which the guide continued answering our questions. After viewing the presentation, the guide cleared some doubts and talked about some interesting myths regarding Coca-Cola. We learned that you do not die after eating a mentos and then having Coca-Cola. After the interesting discussion session, we preceded toward taking a trip of the factory. We went out of the presentation room and walked down a hallway looking through the windows to view the factory. The first room I saw looked like a laboratory. The people down there were mixing stuff and doing other tests which, the guide told us were to ensure the quality of the beverage. We continued looking through windows and saw huge room wuth huge machines and a network of conveyer belts with bottles of Coca-cola on them, unfilled. We learned that the bottles were made in another room. They, then passed through scanning machine where X-rays were taken to ensure the corect shape of the bottle. The bottles were, then cleaned using water on a circular machine in the middle of the room. The cans were also carried on conveyer belt without lids, cleaned, filled and then capped. Each bottle, can passed through a white sensor that was to count the no. of cans/bottles produced so that the limit imposed by the government was not violated. X-Rays were used to ensure that the liquid in each bottle was equal. Defected bottles/ cans were taken and made again. The water used in the factory was purified and used again. There was a lot of noise in the factory, mainly because the recycled stuff had to be reformed. The workers wore ear-mufs. After a tour of the factory, we watched some interesting coke ads. We left the factory after about 2 hours.
On the whole, it was a unique and fun experience.

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