Soft Drinks Surplus: Inventory Type Guide

Soft drinks are some of the heaviest stock a warehouse holds for what it is worth, and that changes how a surplus should be handled. A pallet of cans takes the same floor space as a pallet of crisps and far more weight, and every week it waits, the date code on it gets closer while the cost of keeping it stays the same. This guide is written for soft drinks manufacturers, brand owners, importers, distributors, wholesalers and retailers holding carbonates, water, juice, energy and sports drinks, mixers, cordials or squash they are not going to sell through the channel they were bought for. The desk buys short-dated and surplus soft drinks outright, so what follows is the buyer's side of it: what decides whether a drinks load can move, and what to have ready before you list it.

One limit first. The desk trades soft drinks only. Nothing stronger is on the list, so take any such lines off before you send it.

How soft drinks surplus arises

Soft drinks sit inside the wider grocery picture, and the food & drink surplus guide covers the common causes in general terms. The ones that come up most in drinks are these.

• The weather does not turn up. Drinks are bought in for the warm months, and a cool or wet summer leaves the warm-weather stock behind.
• Promotions that outlast the price. Price-marked packs, banded multipacks and bonus packs are printed for a window, and the leftovers need a buyer who can sell that exact pack.
• Event and seasonal packs. Packs printed for a tournament, a summer campaign or Christmas lose their point when the moment passes, and mixers bought in for summer and Christmas peaks often come out the other side surplus.
• Launches that did not take. A new flavour or a new energy line is bought in deep to support the launch, and a slow start leaves pallets behind.
• A pack change or a range review. New artwork, a new bottle size, a recipe change or a delist strands the old stock overnight, though the drink inside is sound.

These are the same commercial problem in different clothes: sound stock in the wrong place, or at the wrong time. What is specific to drinks is the weight, the date and the print on the pack.

Weight is the clock

Most surplus is a question of date or of space. Soft drinks are both at once, because they are heavy and bulky for what they are worth.

Holding costs land hard. Racking, floor space, insurance and handling cost much the same per pallet whatever is on it, so for a pallet of drinks the cost of keeping it is a bigger share of what it is worth than for most lines. The real cost of holding overstock sets out that ledger.

Loads fill on weight, not space. A lorry full of drinks can reach its weight limit before it runs out of room, so how the pallets are built and what they weigh matters more than it does for lighter stock. If you know the pallet weights, put them on the list.

A tightening code is urgent, not awkward. On a light line, a few months left on the code is a pricing detail. On a heavy one it is a deadline, because the stock cannot be moved around cheaply while it waits and the buyers who take short codes plan their own ranges ahead. List drinks when the code starts to tighten, not when it has nearly gone.

Dates on soft drinks: best before

Soft drinks are food in law, and almost every ambient soft drink carries a best-before date rather than a use-by. A best-before marks how long the drink keeps its best quality. It is not a safety limit, and drinks past it can be sold lawfully while they are still of acceptable quality. Where UK law draws the line on dates explains the general rule, and selling best-before-expired stock sets out how that side of the market works.

What changes after the date is the drinking, not the safety.

• The fizz goes first. Carbonated drinks slowly lose their carbonation, and plastic bottles let it out faster than cans or glass, which is why the same drink often carries a shorter code in a bottle than in a can.
• Diet and zero-sugar lines can lose some sweetness as they age, and flavours can soften.
• Cordials, squash and concentrates keep longest, and they are light on the pallet for the number of drinks they make.

Chilled drinks are a different matter. Chilled juices, smoothies and anything else carrying a use-by date run on cold-chain rules, and a passed use-by is a hard stop: the desk never trades it. The chilled and frozen guide covers that side.

Price-marked and plain packs

A price-marked pack carries its shelf price on the can, the bottle or the sleeve, and that price travels with it. It tells a shopper what they will pay, and a retailer selling it takes their margin out of the buying price, not the ticket.

• Price-marked packs suit convenience and independent retail, symbol groups and the wholesalers that supply them, where shoppers look for the printed price.
• Plain packs suit buyers who set their own shelf price, such as discount and value chains, and they travel more easily to export, where a sterling price on the can means nothing.
• An old price mark is part of the product. A pack printed at last year's price sells at that price, so the printed price decides who can take the load and at what cost.

Both kinds sell, so neither is a reason to hold stock back. What matters is that the list says which lines are price-marked and what price is printed on them.

The format decides the rest: who can take a load and how it moves.

Labels from other markets

Drinks packed for export, or bought in from abroad, turn up in surplus as often as anything. UK food labelling requires the compulsory information to be in English, either printed on the pack or on a label attached to it, and Trading Standards' Business Companion sets out the rule. A pack without it needs an English label adding before it goes on a UK shelf, or finds its home in export, often in the market it was packed for. Say which languages are on each line, and the offer is made with every route in view.

The state of the load

• Shrink and trays. Split shrink lets multipacks come apart in handling. Count the damaged layers and say whether the packs inside are sound.
• Cans and bottles. Count crushed or dented cans separately. A broken glass bottle means glass in the wrap, so say if there has been any breakage.
• Leakers. One leaking bottle makes a pallet sticky and spoils the cases around it, so take leakers out before collection rather than leaving them for goods-in to find.
• Swollen packs. Any can, bottle or carton that has swollen, bulged or blown its seal is out of the trade, whatever its date.
• Frost and heat. Drinks expand as they freeze, which can split cans and distort bottles, and heat and strong sun do the flavour no favours. Tell us how the stock has been stored, and whether it has spent any time outside.

What makes a soft drinks load sellable

• Intact shrink and sound outers. The pack is what the end customer buys, so its condition is half the product.
• Readable date codes and batch numbers. Read them off the packs, not the stock system, which knows when a pallet arrived but not what is printed on it.
• Price marks flagged, with the printed price for each line.
• English labelling, or a clear note of the languages on each pack.
• A clean storage history. Indoors, out of frost and out of direct sun. Where storage has been imperfect, say so: priced honestly it is often still saleable, discovered later it is not.
• Nothing under recall or withdrawal. Any batch subject to a recall or a withdrawal is out of the trade entirely, however sound the rest of the load is.

Where soft drinks surplus goes

Branded soft drinks are among the quickest resales in value retail, and they reach a wide spread of buyers.

• Discount and value chains, who sell branded drinks below the usual shelf price and set their own.
• Convenience and forecourt wholesale, including cash-and-carry, feeding the impulse trade where price-marked packs fit.
• Buying groups and symbol retail, spreading a load across member stores.
• Exporters, where UK brands carry demand and plain or foreign-language packs fit.
• Events, leisure, vending and workplace supply, buying volume for venues, machines and fridges.

The desk sells into all of these, so a mixed load does not need splitting before it leaves your site. That happens after collection.

What to put on the list

• Product and brand, exactly as the pack words them, with the flavour or variant, regular, diet or zero.
• Format and pack size: can, plastic bottle, glass, carton or concentrate, single or multipack, with units per case.
• Quantity, by case and by pallet, with pallet weights if you know them.
• Dates, read off the packs.
• Batch numbers, also read off the packs.
• Price marks, flagged by line, with the printed price.
• Languages, for any pack not labelled in English.
• Condition: shrink, dents, breakage and leakers, counted.
• Storage conditions and location, and how the pallets come out of the building.

What we buy sets out the drinks lines on the desk and the condition they can be in. Payment terms are agreed per deal and stated in the written offer, so you know them before you accept anything.

Next steps

1. Take off anything that is not a soft drink, then separate sound stock from anything leaking, swollen, past a use-by or under withdrawal, and count each group.
2. Read the date codes and batch numbers off the packs, and flag the price-marked lines and any foreign-language packs.
3. Get a stock offer with formats, quantities, dates and location. We aim to come back with a written offer within 24 hours of the list landing.
4. Read the written offer, ask about anything unclear, then accept it or walk away.

Holding soft drinks with a code that is starting to tighten? Ask the desk; the product, the format, the date and a rough quantity is enough for a first read.