Why Don't All Cans Have Pull-Tabs?

Cans make preserving and transporting food and drinks simple, but canning technology is very complex. Learn the history of pull-tabs and can openers in this episode of BrainStuff, based on this article: https://money.howstuffworks.com/food-cans-pull-tabs.htm

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of iHeartRadio, Hey brain
Stuff Laurin Vogel bomb here. Aluminum cans are convenient, inexpensive,
and generally sanitary ways to package and transport many foods
and drinks. Now. Canning technology has existed since the first
decade of the eighteen hundreds, but the ruttary blade can

(00:24):
opener that we're familiar with today wasn't invented until the
eighteen seventies. For the seventy some intervening years, there were
likely a lot of bashed or cut fingers from hammers
and chisels, knives, and other less specialized or less safe tools.
These days, can openers are widely available, but not every

(00:46):
can needs one. Many canned foods and drinks come with
a poll tab that's even more convenient. So why do
some cans have them and others don't. The short answer
is money, But for the long answer, let's look at
the history of this innovation. The story goes that in
nineteen fifty nine, a humble engineer from Dayton, Ohio, by

(01:08):
the name of Ernie Fras was enjoying a family picnic
when he realized that he'd forgotten to bring a church
key you see, although beer had cut in cans starting
in nineteen thirty five, those cans had solid lids, the
same as any other can. To access the contents, you'd
use a tool called a church key that would pop
a hole in the lid. These are still sometimes used,

(01:32):
especially in bars, to open things like canned pineapple juice.
But so at this picnic, a Phrase searched in vain
for something to open his beer with and settled on
the bumper of his car, which resulted in a messy
geyser of beer. Always the engineer, Phrase vowed to come
up with an invention that would eliminate the need for

(01:53):
a church key altogether. In nineteen sixty three, he patented
the easy Open Been lid, a which, similar to modern
beer and soda cans, had a shape scored into the
top and a polltab riveted onto that shape at one end,
so by pulling the tab, the weakened parts of the
aluminum would give way and you could peel the scorge

(02:16):
shape off, leaving a hole in the lid. Phrase's first
customer was Iron City Beer in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, which marketed
this revolutionary poll tab technology as the snaptop. Frase would
pass away in nineteen eighty nine, but his company DRT
is still making its patented easy open ends for food

(02:37):
and beverage cans. For the article this episode is based
on How Stuffworks, spoke with Tom Cruthers, who's worked at
DRT for forty years, most recently as its VP of sales.
They asked him why, at nearly sixty years after the
invention of the easy open can, only some canned foods
come with pole tabs while many still require a can opener.

(03:00):
Crothers said, I wish all cans had easy open tabs
with beep even busier. Basically, what it gets down to
is a cost issue. Easy open ends are more expensive
than sanitary ends, a sanitary end being the industry lingo
for the solid can lids that require a separate can opener.

(03:22):
You may have never thought twice about how your can of, say,
tomato soup, was made. But this is precision engineering, just saying.
DRT has divisions that deal with aerospace and medical manufacturing,
and Crothers says that the metal packaging division there, which
designs and sells the industrial machines that stamp out easy

(03:42):
open ends, is much more precise than anything else. They do.
The permissible variation in the measurements in their packaging products
is mere microns across, the micron being one thousandth of
a millimeter. Okay. There are two parts to every hand,
the shell, which is the aluminum body, and the ends,

(04:04):
which are the top and bottom. For a can with
a plain old sanitary top, both ends are stamped from
a flat sheet of metal and sealed to the shell
with a process called double seaming. You can picture this
double seam like two question marks attached by their crooks.
All right, say you draw a normal question mark on

(04:24):
a piece of paper. You can think of the straight
vertical line of the mark as the side of the can.
Then draw a second question mark, starting the tip of
the crook inside the crook of the first one, and
extending the straight line of the mark in a horizontal
line over top of the first mark. That's your lid.
The two crooks and the way that they curve around

(04:47):
each other form the double seam. Manufacturers crimp them together
using a bit of glue to seal them. This is
not simple, but cans with a pole tab are more
expensive because there are more steps to the manufacturing process. First,
the end piece destined to be, the lid has to
be scored with incredible precision. The scoring needs to be

(05:11):
shallow enough that it remains strong enough to hold the
contents inside, often under pressure or to withstand a fall
from a store shelf. But the scoring has to be
deep enough that the lid will pop open easily when
the tab is pulled. That's why Drt's machines are tuned
down to the micron. And then there's the poll tab itself,

(05:32):
a separate piece of aluminum that needs to be stamped
from a sheet of aluminum and riveted to the end.
That extra material and tooling also costs money, which is
passed on to consumers in the price of a poll
tab can. There's no argument that easy open lids are
well easier to open than containers that require a can opener,

(05:52):
but that convenience comes at a cost. That's why you're
more likely to find poll tabs on name brand items
with a higher priced Cruther's explained a lot of the
decision about whether to use an easy open end has
to do with brand image. If you pick up a
can of Progresso or Campbell's soup, you're going to find
easy open ends. If you find a smaller brand or

(06:14):
a store brand, those will most likely have sanitary ends.
In some markets, particularly in the developing world, cost is
the primary consideration. Even big brands might forego poll tabs
in those markets to keep the price down. And then
there are transport considerations. Since easy open lids are scored,

(06:35):
they are slightly more likely to break open if traveling
over rough roads. A sanitary end is going to be
more secure in places with less developed infrastructure. Today's episode
is based on the article why don't all food cans
have polltabs? On HowStuffWorks dot Com written by Dave Ruse.

(06:57):
Brain Stuff is a production of iHeartRadio in partnership with
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