TWIST AND SHOUT?

Drinking from a bottle has suddenly become maddening, due to lids that remain attached. But the development is rooted in the battle against plastic waste

- Katie Rosseinsky

Who knew that cracking open a plastic bottle could ruin your week? This once simple act now comes with a side order of drama. Try to sip from your bottle and you’ll find yourself doing unfortunate facial contortions as it pokes into your nose or prods your chin.

If you’re really unlucky, you’ll catch some rogue liquid in the lid, which will then inevitably catapult all down your top, leaving you looking a bit like a sad, soggy toddler who’s still finessing their motor skills. Attempt to snap the thin attachment connecting the cap to the bottle rim to avoid repeating this mess and you risk soaking yourself again, too.

The culprit, of course, is that little bit of plastic that keeps lids attached to bottles. The new design has quietly snuck onto the soft drinks aisle over the past couple of years. If you believe its detractors, this tiny but unwelcome addition to the packaging has turned a relatively straightforward process – grab bottle, remove lid, sip and enjoy – into a high-jeopardy activity.

One social media user branded the development “the worst thing to happen to humanity since the removal of the headphone jack [on smartphones]” – hyperbole, of course, but one that perhaps sums up the outsized consternation with which this change has been received in some quarters. Will you drench yourself in front of your colleagues if you dare take a gulp of water during an important meeting? Or will you simply funnel liquid all over your laptop? The possibilities are endless.

The correct way to describe a lid like this is “tethered”. The design can be traced back to a European Union directive that was initially proposed in 2018 then officially adopted the following year, with a deadline put in place: from 3 July 2024, the EU stated, caps on all non-returnable plastic drinks bottles with a capacity of three litres or less must stay attached after opening.