Coca-Cola Canada Bottling employees create sculpture for community to enjoy

The employees of Coca-Cola Canada Bottling are so proud of a new public art installation in front of the Chatham plant, two parking spots are being designated so people can stop and look at it.

The art work was unveiled Sept. 12 as part of the fifth anniversary celebration by the current owners, the Tanenbaum and Bridgeman families, which have locations across Canada.

Local employees used a resin to create a 1.5 meter replica of a Coke bottle within a maple leaf made out of old pieces of cooler shelving, which highlights the company’s commitment to environmental sustainability.

Plant manager Rene Lapointe said Coca-Cola Canada Bottling, which serves Canada with new and refurbished coolers and fountain pop equipment, is “committed to making a difference in the local community where we operate.”

He said the art installation, which also features LED lights that can be programmed for every special occasion from Christmas to Pride Week, was designed to “deliver optimism” to those living, working and visiting Chatham-Kent.

Having public art installations around the community is a municipally driven initiative Mayor Darrin Canniff has been promoting enthusiastically.

Prior to the unveiling, he recalled bringing up the initiative during a corporate visit with Coca-Cola Canada Bottling, noting within three weeks the local company already had a plan in the works.

The mayor said the municipality is talking with a number of businesses and organizations looking to do public art installations.

In the next few years, Canniff hopes to see up to 40 of these types of art installations across the municipality becoming a tourist attraction.

“This is not just a sculpture,” Canniff said. “You should be proud of what you’ve done.”

Canniff predicts when looking back, the local company’s art installation will be seen as being on “the ground floor” of an arts and culture renaissance in Chatham-Kent.

“We hope that this project may inspire other companies in Chatham-Kent to find creative ways to connect with the community,” Lapointe said.

He added two parking spots are being designated at the plant for people to stop and look at the art work.

Lapointe said the size of the resin bottle was no small feat to create, adding he worked with a Quebec company called Magic Resin.

However, he said, “They couldn’t help very much, because they said, ‘Nobody’s ever made a resin cast that big.’”

The bottle mold had to be put in a large cooler because it had to be done in three to four pours, since the resin got so hot, Lapointe said.

“I slept over three nights watching it,” he said.

He added he was getting up at 4 am he was up stuffing bags of ice under the mold trying to cool it down.

Lapointe also said a team of employees worked for 17 hours on Sept. 9 to make sure the sculpture would be ready to be unveiled.

Long-time employee Randy Stoddard said the project was a collaborative effort with fellow employees.

He said it took about four months to create the resin bottle for the artwork, adding it was a learning process all along.

“We had no specs, we had to make our own specs of everything,” Stoddard said.

He said they made a fiberglass mold using a recycling bin they had at the plant and went from there.

Looking at the finished product, Stoddard, who admitted he can be too picky at time, said, “I like it.

“I’m amazed it’s an almost five-foot Coke bottle and it’s made out of something we usually use for glue,” he said.

Stoddard also is impressed with the sheet metal work fellow employees did for the sculpture.

In keeping with the company’s commitment to environmental sustainability, local employees chose the Lower Thames Valley Conservation Foundation to receive a $10,000 donation as part of the corporation’s commitment to donate $250,000 to local charities across Canada.

On the business front, company CEO Todd Parsons reminded local employees of a promise he made that “once we get the business to where it needs to be, you’re going to see us investing hard to grow (the plant) and make it more successful and thriving.”

He said there are a number of projects being looked at for expanding production in Chatham-Kent.

“We’ve been considering what that might look like for shipping coolers into the US with other bottlers that were part of a network,” Parsons said.

He said the local facility was expanded last year to take on soda fountain business, which includes the bar guns, soda fountains and dispensers all being serviced out of the Chatham plant.

“One of the things you have to do to run a great business is invest in people,” Parsons said. “When you invest in people then they’re part of the business for the long-term.”