Soft drinks giant Coca-Cola (London / UK; www.coca-cola.co.uk) has confirmed the closures of two of its UK sites. The company said it planned to close a production facility in Milton Keynes and a distribution centre in Northampton as part of a drive to boost productivity and efficiency levels. Both sites will close in 2019, costing 288 people their jobs, although the drinks firm said it would be creating 121 positions elsewhere across the business. It added that some of the staff affected by the announced closures could be moved to those positions.

Coca-Cola’s Milton Keynes site was established in 1976 and produces 60m cases of soft drinks a year with nine manufacturing lines. It also produces "Bag-in-Box" packaging and Capri Sun's 200 ml pouches. The site employs 220 people and is a direct supplier to McDonald's.

In addition to the facility at Milton Keynes, it has five other manufacturing sites in the UK, in East Kilbride, Morpeth, Wakefield, Edmonton and Sidcup. Coca-Cola employs around 4,000 people in the UK.

In October 2017, the company also announced it will close its manufacturing site in Weimar / Germany – see Plasteurope.com of 18.10.2017. PET bottles are produced at this site, and 178 jobs will be affected. Talks about the Weimar location of Coca-Cola European Partners Germany were concluded in November, and production and administration will be stopped as planned on 1 March 2018, and the site will be closed. Part of the existing logistics could be relocated to a suitable site in the nearby area, and a new sales warehouse with 28 employees is planned to be in operation on 1 September 2018.