Flexible Packaging Materials and Structures in 2014: Eight Industry Shifts Already Underway

Fashions come and go, and before you know it, the trends around you may have cycled through several rounds. By contrast, flexible packaging structures—one of the industry’s longer-lasting trends—seem to have greater staying power because they change over a longer period. The following are flexible packaging structures that have already shifted or are still shifting.

1. Cartons and boxes offer more opening options and easier handling. Today’s packs often rely on small components for opening and closing; zippers on certain stand-up pouches, for instance, let users twist the pack open instead of tearing it. Machinery has advanced as well: with more functions integrated, it can now deliver a one-stop process from filling through packaging in the shortest possible time.
2. Clear high-barrier films. A new generation of transparent films and coatings is moving closer to the barrier performance of metal foil and metallized films. This structure supports product visibility, allowing shoppers to see appetizing food directly, while also making microwave heating more convenient.
3. The packaging of choice for new products. After years of development, flexible packaging is widely expected to spread across virtually all product categories. Tuna and pet food are classic examples: following decades of canning, retort pouches have become widely adopted. More recently, glass jars for baby food have also given way to retort pouches.
4. Staying one step ahead. Now that ketchup in larger, more flexible stand-up pouches is no longer a novelty, pouch packaging for other condiments is unlikely to lag far behind. Successful test launches in Europe, Asia and Latin America have proven the concept to be a remarkable success. New packaging for shampoo and laundry detergent arrived when the timing was right, and the same applies to canned fruit.
5. Breakfast cereal flexible packaging advances slowly worldwide. In both low-end and high-end markets, flexible packaging has come onto cereal manufacturers’ radar. Experts acknowledge, however, that a rapid switch to flexible packaging would require very heavy investment in packaging machinery. In addition, although renewable resources offer many benefits, it is unlikely that flexible packaging materials can be directly replaced by recycled paperboard. The main reason: flexible packaging does not necessarily win acceptance from consumers nationwide, especially Americans.
6. More layers in the coextrusion stage. At first glance, that sounds counterintuitive, yet adding layers to a flexible packaging structure can indeed cut costs and improve performance. The key is tighter control over those layers. 3–5 layer film coextrusion lines are limited by extruder size and die design; 7–9 layer lines can produce flexible packaging materials with better performance and greater thickness, at a lower cost because the structure no longer needs to be redesigned. One route is to use cheaper resin as the bulking layer material. Another is to split the moisture barrier into two thinner layers, with one held in reserve in case pinholes connect with other layers. This approach also increases the number of moisture barrier surfaces, further lowering permeation rates. Various technologies can separate moisture barrier materials into multiple layers, and some data indicate a linear improvement in moisture resistance.
7. Finding the right flexible packaging shape. Contemporary packaging design can create far more shapes than before, and consumer packaged goods companies are eager for new formats because standing out on the shelf is critical to them. The stand-up pouch shape with almost two curved sections removed has fallen out of fashion, even though machines from machinery companies elsewhere are still almost all producing this conical stand-up pouch. At the same time, as stand-up pouch shapes grow more complex, curbing design waste becomes a challenge that must be addressed.
8. The broad impact of pouches. Because pouch structures can be customized on demand, many new physical product forms have emerged: liquid, viscous, powdered, granular and particulate. As a result, categories increasingly overlap, spanning food and beverages, cosmetics, healthcare, pet food, automotive, pharmaceuticals and agricultural products. Flexible packaging filling speeds have not yet matched those of common packaging boxes, but the gap is narrowing, especially for dry products.

This article is reprinted from China Packaging Network (news.pack.cn). Original link: http://news.pack.cn/show-373025.html. All rights belong to the original author; this article is intended for industry exchange and learning only.