Packaging World December 2020 by PMMIMediaGroup

Visit our virtual showroom at PACK EXPO Connects pe.show/158

DEC2020 packworld.com

Colgate: Packaging’s Day Has Come 22

COVID-19 Test Packs Require Speedy Scale-Up 40

End-of-Line Automation Caps Off Craft Brew Lines 44

Olé Puts Unused Space to Work with Nifty Printing 45

Cannabis, CBD Pack Simplifies Brand Story

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VOL27

May Your Holidays be Merry and Safe

NO12

from PMMI Media Group

This year’s View from the Top feature focused on Colgate-Palmolive. Shown here left to right are Strategic Brand Design Manager Jada Britto, Chief Technology Officer Patricia Verduin, Director of Global Packaging Innovation and Sustainability Greg Corra, and Jose Luis Molinar, Global Packaging Director Personal & Home Care. Photo credit, cover and page 35: Tall Paul.

FEATURES 22 COVID-19 Test Medium Production Ramped Up By 20,000% in Six Months Viral Transport Media tubes filled with liquid media are used to store and transport nasal swabs for viruses including COVID-19. Sixteen integrated lines were designed, built, and installed in 20 weeks to meet demand.

28 COVER STORY Colgate: Packaging’s Day Has Come 40

Colgate-Palmolive has made sustainable packaging a key priority. From recyclable toothpaste tubes to aluminum bottles for mouthwash, they’re locked in on eliminating plastic waste and delighting consumers.

40 Craft Brewer Grows into Two-In-One Palletizer, Stretch Wrapper Automation often begets more automation. That was certainly the case with Pelican Brewing Co., whose fast filling operations soon necessitated end-of-line palletization.

44 Olé Mexican Foods Makes a Splash on “Sea of White” Shelf The brand broke new ground in a category that lacked shelf flair by enlisting clever printing on the customer-facing circumference of its puck-shaped thermoformed SVPs.

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COMPACT

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72”

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DEPARTMENTS 11

packworld.com VIDEO

COLUMNS

Pelican Brewing Co. Palletizing, Stretch Wrapping

7 Lead Off 16 The Legal Side 18 The Big Picture 20 Sustainable Packaging 45 Shelf Impact! 48 The Insider

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VIDEO

NEWS/EVENTS

8 News 12 Quotables/By the Numbers

Hill’s Makes Pet Food E-comm/ D2C Friendly

INTERVIEW

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14 First Person PRODUCTS

38 Automation Technology 46 Technology

PACKAGING TV

View PACK EXPO Connects Content ON DEMAND

ADVERTISING

47 Advertiser Index

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EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD Aladin Alkhawam Director, Packaging Operations, Par Pharmaceutical Jan Brücklmeier Technical Application Group Packaging Technology Expert, Nestlé David France Packaging Research Fellow, Conagra Foods Patrick Keenan R&D Packaging Engineer, General Mills/Annie’s Organic Snacks Mike Marcinkowski Global R&D Officer, GPA Global & Hub Folding Box Co. Paul Schaum Chief Operations Officer, Pretzels Inc. David Smith, PhD Principal, David S. Smith & Associates Brian Stepowany Packaging R&D, Senior Manager, B&G Foods, Inc. Jasmine Sutherland President, Texas Food Solutions; Vice President, Perfect Fit Meals

Connect with a Leaders in Packaging supplier and support packaging education!

GUIDELINES

How To Use the How2Recycle Label pwgo.to/5762

Connect with us:

www.packworld.com/leaders

Packaging World® (ISSN # 1073-7367) is a registered trademark of PMMI, The Association for Packaging and Processing Technologies. Packaging World® is published monthly by PMMI with its publishing office, PMMI Media Group, located at 401 N. Michigan Avenue, Suite 300, Chicago, IL 60611; 312.222.1010; Fax: 312.222.1310. Periodicals postage paid at Chicago, IL, and additional mailing offices. Copyright 2020 by PMMI. All rights reserved. Materials in this publication must not be reproduced in any form without written permission of the publisher. Applications for a free subscription may be made online at www.packworld.com/subscribe. Paid subscription rates per year are $200 in the U.S., $285 Canada and Mexico by surface mail; $475 Europe, $715 Far East and Australia by air mail. Single copy price in U.S. is $20. To subscribe or manage your subscription to Packaging World, visit Packworld.com/subscribe. Free digital edition available to qualified individuals outside the United States. POSTMASTER; Send address changes to Packaging World®, 401 N. Michigan Avenue, Suite 300, Chicago, IL 60611. PRINTED IN USA by Quad. The opinions expressed in articles are those of the authors and not necessarily those of PMMI. Comments, questions and letters to the editor are welcome and can be sent to: editors@packworld.com. Mailing List: We make a portion of our mailing list available to reputable firms. If you would prefer that we don’t include your name, please write us at the Chicago, IL address.

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PERFORMANCE, PACKAGED

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EDITORIAL Matt Reynolds Editor Patrick Reynolds Vice President, Editor Emeritus @Packcentric Iris Zavala Managing Editor Anne Marie Mohan Senior Editor @PackagingTrends Jim Chrzan Vice President, Content and Brand Strategy Kim Overstreet Senior Content Strategist, Alignment Eric F. Greenberg, Ben Miyares, Sterling Anthony Contributing Editors

ART David Bacho Creative Director

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PMMI MEDIA GROUP Joseph Angel President, Publisher Susan DaMario Director, Marketing Amber Miller Senior Marketing Manager Bea Greany Brand Operations Manager Sarah Loeffler Director, Media Innovation Janet Fabiano Financial Services Manager Lloyd Ferguson Founding Partner

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David Newcorn Senior Vice President, Digital and Data Elizabeth Kachoris Senior Director, Digital and Data Jen Krepelka Director, Websites & Digital Design Strategy

Packaging World • PMMI Media Group

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LEAD OFF

Boosting Employee Engagement While Confronting COVID-19

EXPERIENCE MATTERS The preferred food-safe choice for thermoformer loading

For this year’s View from the Top feature we checked in on ColgatePalmolive. I’d hoped to visit them in person at what looks to be a mighty impressive Global Technology Campus in Piscataway, N.J. But as we all know, this past year was not very conducive to anything being done in person—from interviews to trade shows to seeing my granddaughters in Germany. Still, thanks to the wonders of Google Meet, I was able to have some incredibly fruitful conversations with the good folks at Colgate, the gist of which you can read beginning on page 28. That story focuses primarily on packaging innovations aimed at helping a nearly $16 billion Consumer Packaged Goods company minimize its carbon footprint. Few would disagree that the firm has made some meaningful strides in 2020. But this was also a year when Colgate showed up big time in the planet’s response to COVID-19. How? By donating 25 million bars of soap to support the World Health Organization’s #SafeHands Challenge. “The WHO is promoting hand-washing as one of the ways to slow the spread of the pandemic, and we’re committed to supporting a healthier future for all,” says Colgate Director of Corporate Communications Tom DiPiazza. “So we called on five of our plants on three continents to start producing these bars of soap as fast as we could. Then we worked with UNICEF, CARE, and Save the Children to get it delivered where it was needed.” “We went at it fast and furious,” says Jose Luis Molinar, Global Packaging Director Personal & Home Care. “It came out of our production sites in Mexico, Brazil, Thailand, South Africa, and Turkey. Within 45 days we were ready to begin shipping.” Mind you, these bars didn’t fly under any of the established Colgate brands such as Irish Spring or Palmolive Classic or Softsoap. Original art had to be created, including hand-washing instructions that appear on the back of the paper wrap or paperboard carton. Chief Technology Officer Patricia Verduin confirms the “fast and furious” aspect of the initiative. “I think it was five senior people in a room who said ‘Let’s do this.’ Then we had to execute on a design, line up the packaging materials, schedule the packaging lines, and work with our supply chain experts to make it happen.” One relatively unintended but certainly beneficial consequence of the project was that it brought with it a truly meaningful boost in employee engagement. “You have to remember,” says Verduin, “when these packages of soap came out, the true impact of the pandemic was just being recognized. It was a very stressful time. So our employees were able to feel good about contributing, feel good that the company they worked for was doing the right thing.” One of those employees was Pablo Silva Freire, who is shown here beside the ACMA wrapping machine he operates in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Thanks, Pablo. Your contribution, and Colgate’s more broadly, is the kind of thing we’ll remember in a year most of us would just as soon forget. PW

reynolds@packworld.com

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NEWS

Ecolean Packages for Chinese Consumers Consumers in China can now enjoy U.S.-owned brand Wholly Moly! dairy-free drinks in this distinctive lightweight flexible package with an air-filled handle. The rising focus on health is one of the key drivers for the popularity of the dairy alternatives market worldwide. At the same time, consumers are making the link between sustainability and their own personal wellbeing. As such, consumers want brands and individuals to take a proactive approach when it comes to protecting the environment and leading a more sustainable lifestyle. Headquartered in Silicon Valley, Calif., and Shanghai, China, Wholly Moly! is a leading brand in whole-grain and oat products tailored to a new generation of Chinese consumers. Aseptically packaged in Shanghai for a nine-month shelf life at ambient temperatures, Wholly Moly!’s oat drinks are set to innovate their product category by not only offering an oat product without any additives, but also through the packaging chosen for the launch. Ecolean’s lightweight packaging solutions address both consumer convenience and environmental awareness. A minimal amount of packaging material means fewer resources used throughout the package’s life cycle—for example less energy and water in production, and lighter packaging during transport. The result: a liquid food package with less impact on the environment, offer-

ing a lighter footprint for both customers and consumers. “Without any additives, Wholly Moly! products retain their original nutrition and sweetness,” says Claire Fang, CEO at Wholly Moly!. “We dare to use the original taste of healthy cereals. The oats grow in the fresh soil and sunlight of the Midwest of the United States and southern part of Canada, and are packaged under strict North American standards, bringing high-quality oat products to health and sustainability conscious consumers in China.” “We welcome the launch of Wholly Moly! oat drinks in Ecolean packages, as a great fit for our approach to sustainability and being a responsible business in the packaging industry,” says Johnny Sajland, Chief Commercial Officer at Ecolean. “As a global packaging producer offering lightweight packaging solutions for both chilled and ambient distribution, Ecolean is active in more than 30 markets worldwide and partners with many of the most well-known brands within the dairy, beverage, and liquid food industry.” Wholly Moly! is a subsidiary of Yum Delight, headquartered in California, U.S. The products are available in the Greater China region and the US, through both direct-to-consumer e-retail and supermarkets and has been available in Ecolean packaging since May 2020. —Pat Reynolds

Italian Converter Augments Digital Printing of Corrugated LIC Packaging, a leading European manufacturer of consumer packaging and display solutions, announced it has purchased a new high-volume inkjet HP PageWide T1190 Press. The multimillion-dollar investment makes LIC the first converter to own HP’s complete portfolio of presses for corrugated packaging and display applications, after taking the lead with HP PageWide C500 digital printing services in Europe. The six-color HP PageWide T1190, a 2.8 meter wide solution running at 305 linear meters/min, will be installed at a LIC factory in northern Italy in the first half 2021. “With this new capability and our existing HP C500 sheetfed press, LIC is uniquely positioned to transform the corrugated graphic packaging and display manufacturing in Europe with an all-digital strategy, offering both mainstream productivity and premium quality,” says Piero Bertoldo, President at LIC Packaging. The HP digital solution allows full flexibility for print on demand to fulfill long-run production as well as customization for seasonal, geographic, and promotional versioning, including with variable data—efficiently. As a result, LIC will be able to offer enhanced flexibility with scaled packaging and display solutions for orders from several hundred boxes to millions with short lead times, says Bertoldo. For brands, the ability to customize packaging offers unique packaging and display solutions to engage consumers both at

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point of sale and via ecommerce. Additionally, the HP PageWide solutions enable LIC to offer an enhanced sustainability offering to its brand customers with digital on-demand technology, recyclability, and water-based inks. LIC creates enhanced value for brands through stunning graphics on a variety of coated and uncoated substrates. The T1190 press digitally pre-prints corrugated liners, enabling LIC to take full advantage of its corrugator capabilities on site. “LIC’s digital expansion with HP will enable it to continue to disrupt the corrugated packaging supply chain, driving greater business efficiency for themselves and their brand customers, while providing the flexibility and agility to respond to dynamic market needs,” says Ted Samotis, Director Go-to-Market, HP PageWide Industrial. —Pat Reynolds

11/20/20 6:03 AM

Mystical Northern Lights Captured on Holographic Carton

New Sustainable Milk Carton

Crisp and iridescent in shimmering shades of green and blue, a new carton from Finnish spirits producer Arctic Brands Group for its premium handcrafted gin features a holographic design inspired by the Northern Lights that is lifting brand sales in Finland and winning accolades throughout the packaging community. The carton uses a unique holographic metallization effect that uses 1% of the aluminum of traditional foil laminates, thereby also helping protect the environment that it so gorgeously depicts. In 2018, paperboard producer Metsä Board worked with Arctic Brands on a carton for its Arctic Blue Gin for distribution in Finland and Europe. The carton depicted a rugged Finnish landscape of rocks, trees, and water, printed with a range of techniques that conveyed a 3D illusion (see pwgo.to/5791). The rustic winter-scape matched the gin’s taste profile, described by the brand as “colourless, dry, warm, juniper berry notes, wild berry notes, light cardamom notes, hint of pine.” For the brand’s launch in the U.S., Metsä suggested the use of the holographic effect, from U.S.-based specialty paper converter Hazen Paper Company, to simulate the Northern Lights as a way to create a Special Edition version of the gin. Arctic Brands embraced the idea, and Metsä moved forward, creating the structure, graphics, and embossing of the carton, which is made from MetsäBoard Pro FBB Bright paperboard. The Northern Lights image was accomplished by printing on top of Envirofoil, a plastic-free holographic metallization effect from Hazen that carries 20 times less material per square inch than metallic ink, making the carton fully recyclable. Hazen designed the holographic effect and the opaque white plates for rendering the effect, and incorporated a PMS spot-color green plate to highlight some detail in the package. As the viewing angle changes, the holography flashes and moves like an animation. The optical effect is created with a sub-micron embossing grid in the transfer-metallized layer. The ultra-thin coating layer provides visual impact typical of much thicker structures. AM Packaging printed and converted the package at its plant in Chicopee, Mass. “The result is as close to an actual northern lights flare as printed materials can accomplish,” remarks Mark Beamesderfer, Packaging Services Director for the Americas, Metsä Board. The carton was converted in October 2019 and was released for the Christmas season in travel retail locations in Finland. “Now all our products are sold in this package here in Finland and in Japan,” shares Arctic Brands Group Brand Manager Toni Eurasto. Although the carton was originally intended for the U.S. market, the pandemic has delayed its U.S. launch, Eurasto adds. “We are discussing with different partners about entering the U.S. market in 2021,” he says. “Due to COVID-19, the process for market entry has become slower.” Meanwhile, the carton has won the 2020 AIMCAL Product of the Year Award as well as a ScanStar 2020 award from the Finnish Packaging Association. “Both in Finland and especially in the Japanese market consumers are crazy about this package,” says Eurasto. “We have received very good feedback from our distributors from both of our main markets. Finland sales are rising now that we have this package in all alcohol retail outlets here.” —Anne Marie Mohan

Clover Sonoma, a thirdgeneration family-owned and operated dairy based in Petaluma, Calif., is transitioning its half-gallon organic milk to a fully renewable plant-based paperboard milk carton. The PlantCarton packages with RenewablePlus paperboard by Evergreen utilize the latest in plantbased paperboard technology and incorporate a renewable coating made with polyethylene created from sugarcane. As a result, these cartons are made with approximately 97% renewable material, which includes, in addition to polyethylene made from sugarcane, paper made from trees grown in forests where responsible forestry practices are used. And PlantCarton packages are recyclable. “As a company, we continuously look for innovative approaches to reaching sustainability goals, and packaging is an important part of that,” says Kristel Corson, Vice President of Sales and Marketing at Clover Sonoma. “We are the first dairy to switch to Evergreen Packaging’s fully renewable plant-based milk carton, and we chose the RenewablePlus cartons because they support responsible forest management while utilizing less plastic, encouraging recycling, and decreasing the use of fossil fuels.” “As the world’s most trusted forest certification, the Forest Stewardship Council demonstrates that Clover Sonoma and Evergreen Packaging are meeting the highest standards of responsible forest management,” says Chris McLaren, Chief Markets and Marketing Officer for FSC® US. Evergreen Packaging is Forest Stewardship Council certified (FSC®-C016043). “The technology utilized in this carton creates a PlantCarton package that provides all the freshness protection and operational efficiency associated with other PlantCarton packages, but gives our customers more of what they want in terms of renewability,” says DeWitt Clark, VP North American Packaging Sales for Evergreen Packaging. Clover Sonoma is the first company to utilize this offering from Evergreen. The cartons offer the same reliable performance in the printing, package converting, and form-fill-seal processes. —Pat Reynolds

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NEWS

PACK EXPO Connects Reflects Adaptable Industry PACK EXPO Connects brought the industry together during its launch week Nov. 9-13, with nearly 18,000 attendees engaging with more than 700 exhibitors to find solutions to critical packaging challenges. “The demos offered at PACK EXPO Connects proved to be an invaluable resource for discovering the latest innovations from top suppliers and learning more about their areas of expertise,” says Shawn French, director of engineering, Danone. “Exhibitor commitment to delivering high-quality content was evident and show site features like the search function provided highly specified, tailored results, granting me the ability to find the solutions I needed with ease.” Despite exhibitor preparedness, technical issues kept the live demonstrations from launching as intended on Monday, but the PACK EXPO Connects exhibitors adapted and demos returned for attendees looking to see technology in action the remainder of the event. “This event was able to connect the industry, which was our number one goal in a year when professionals cannot attend physical trade events,” says Jim Pittas, president and CEO, PMMI. “And our exhibitors were remarkable in their ability to react and deliver effective demonstrations despite the technical challenges entirely outside of their control.” To date, PACK EXPO Connects has seen 137,000 unique directory visits

“We were successful in providing live demonstrations of our equipment after switching over to the Zoom platform after [a few] technical difficulties on Monday morning,” Nelson said. “We formed a plan as a team to put our demonstration agenda into an easily emailable format and each morning I downloaded our list of demonstration attendees from the Exhibitor Section of the PACK EXPO Connects website.” Nelson was pleased with the feedback he received regarding their virtual showroom. Customers were particularly pleased with the interactions and detailed information his team could provide in the chat as the demonstrations were live. Josh Becker, Senior Manager, Packaging Systems, Hershey, appreciated the flexibility that the online format offered him and his team. “At PACK EXPO Connects, I enjoyed taking advantage of attending the exhibitor demonstrations the most. It’s been helpful to attend the various sessions available and learn more about the latest cutting-edge trends in packaging operations, such as augmented reality,” Becker says. “The structure and flexibility of the show allowed us to see a diverse range of what the industry is offering.” In addition to demos, educational offerings—many debuting for the first time at PACK EXPO Connects—produced engagement surpassing expectations. More than 800 attendees tuned in live to Dr. Kim Houchens, Director, Customer Packaging Experience, at Amazon’s keynote address, which remains available on-demand at packexpoconnects.com. The daily Jumpstart sessions each averaged 400 viewers seeking insights into key trends and technologies. And every day, over a dozen Innovation Stages, afternoon Trend Chats, and Daily Downloads with PMMI Media Group editors attracted high daily participation. The Solutions Room wrapped up the week on Friday with targeted interactions from the OpX Leadership Network, Organization for Machine Automation and Control (OMAC), the Institute of Packaging Professionals, and the Contract Packaging Association. “PACK EXPO Connects offered a unique opportunity to report on industry developments via a new digital format,” says Jim Chrzan, vice president, content and brand development, PMMI Media Group. “I’m incredibly proud of our team and grateful to Amazon, General Mills, Bush Brothers, and many industry experts who presented. Engagement from the packaging and processing community was exciting to see and the experience has expanded our vision of the many ways we can deliver content.” Engagement will continue through March 31, 2021, with on-demand demos, educational sessions, and showrooms remaining available as resources for industry professionals in the coming months. Access all live recordings from the show through March 31, 2021, at pwgo.to/5811. —Sean Riley

CONNECTS

with 475,000 total showroom visits since the event website went live. During the show week, attendees viewed demos over 32,000 times. Those numbers will continue to grow as engagement continues on the event website, packexpoconnects.com, with on-demand demos and exhibitor showrooms available through March 31, 2021. Exhibitor Engage Technologies Corporation and its family of companies, including Squid Ink, Eastey, and AFM, attained nearly 1,000 new contacts through PACK EXPO Connects, according to Marketing Manager Josh Nelson.

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Distillery Meets Gallery, and the Bottle is the Canvas West Michigan Rum Company’s Burl & Sprig believes that it represents a different kind of distillery since, according to Burl & Sprig team members, it’s a place where creativity, innovation, and the artisanal spirit are celebrated as much as a barrel of rum. From their travels all over the world searching for the finest ingredients, to their imaginative signature cocktails, to their beautiful tasting room decor and artistic package design, the company’s passion for design and craft can be seen in everything they do. With art and artistry as key components of the Burl & Sprig brand story, having beautiful bottles for their premium spirits was a top priority. For this, the brand worked with Berlin Packaging’s design division, Studio One Eleven. “I absolutely love the design and the direction that the brand took,” says Cody Wasilchenko, Burl & Sprig owner. “It definitely sets us apart from everyone else. We just went into distribution in July and the feedback on the packaging has been extremely positive. A lot of variables went into finding the right artwork for the bottles and I’m really happy with how it turned out. We’re planning to launch six new products and have already begun looking for new art.” The design team started by finding stock bottles that break the mold from the traditional rounded shapes that line the liquor store shelf. The 750-ml premium glass rum bottle has a cube silhouette that is meant to reflect the brand’s creativity and quality. The large square sides provided a canvas for brand design, so Studio One Eleven’s designers incorporated the co-owner’s art background and love of surrealism into the label. The graphics, the company says, represent a journey into the unconscious mind, playing with the juxtaposition of dreams and reality. Artists from all over the world created one-of-a-kind pieces for each product in the line, resulting in a portfolio fit for a gallery. The surreal artwork is married with a simple band for branding, and a unique wood-texture fingerprint brandmark speaks to the uniqueness of dreams as well as each artist leaving their individual mark. The digitally printed pressure sensitive labels—two on every bottle—are made from matte textured paper. Silver foil and embossment is used for the Burl & Sprig logo. All labels are die cut from a roll and manually applied at the distillery. The primary label carries the artwork and is placed on the front and wraps to the right side of the bottle. The second one begins from the left side and displays the brand story, artist name, barcode, etc., and wraps to the front of the bottle. This is the label that carries the brand and type of rum and origin. The bartop [cork-style spirits closure] is clear plastic with a white synthetic shank, supplied by Tapi. A tamper-evident ribbon label on the bartop carries the brand name and reinforces the brand presence. The tall bottles have white cigar bands, while the short bottles that carry the premium rums use a black ribbon label with silver foil embossed logo and hit of bright color that points to aging. “The bottles are beautiful ‘canvases’ that bring the bottles to life and capture the unconscious minds of different artists from all over the world. The labels showcase bright and bold creative talents,” says Toni Galabova, Senior Brand Design Director, Studio One Eleven. “The three-sided labels wrap the bottle, forming a ‘unity’ bottle.” The Burl & Sprig custom bottle earned a silver medal at the 2020 National Association of Container Distributors (NACD) packaging awards competition. The NACD awards celebrate the year’s most innovative packaging solutions. PW

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QUOTABLES

BY THE NUMBERS

90%

The number of people in consumer testing that said that the new PepsiCo 2-L bottle is easier to hold and grip, with most being able to hold it with one hand

Billion

The value of healthy snacks producer KIND North America, which was acquired by confectionery, food, and petcare products and services company Mars in November, as reported by The New York Times

287

tons

The amount of plastic U.K. supermarket chain Tesco will save by switching its cheese packaging from a traditional square-block shape to a rectangular package and by removing the current resealable zipper

25,000

The number of products that will be awarded Amazon’s new Climate Pledge Friendly label, signifying one of 19 different sustainability certifications

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“[With] The internet shopping boom due to the pandemic, e-commerce volumes have gone forward 5 years overnight, which is leading to companies accelerating their automation plans. What companies were planning for 2024-2025 is happening now due to the coronavirus. Companies realize they need to be less reliant on human labor, and that they need to make manufacturing and warehousing more resilient and efficient. Mobile automation has been recognized as the answer.” –Ash Sharma, Senior Research Director at Interact Analysis, in a press release from the market research firm, “Mobile robot revenues set to grow by 24% in 2020 despite COVID-19 pandemic”

“You think, as a designer, how difficult is it to redesign a bottle? The reality is, when you need to redesign a bottle with this scale . . . and this impact on the world and business, it is probably one of the most difficult projects I ever faced in my career.” –Mauro Porcini, SVP and Chief Design Officer at PepsiCo., as quoted in an article, “After 30 years, PepsiCo redesigned the two-liter bottle. Here’s why”

“Shoppers are navigating the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic with a variety of altered behaviors, creating opportunities for manufacturers and retailers that recognize and address these new behaviors quickly. CPG companies that satisfy these changing needs gain the opportunity to attract new shoppers as well as win back shoppers that might have migrated to other brands and/or channels earlier in the pandemic.” –Joan Driggs, Vice President of Content and Thought Leadership at IRI, in an article from Prepared Foods magazine, “IRI Holiday Research Predicts Disrupted Consumer Behaviors, CPG Opportunities”

“A paper bottle opens up a whole new world of packaging possibilities, and we are convinced that paper packaging has a role to play in the future. We also reflect on how our consumers will react to this paper bottle. Topics like when and where it could be sold and how it can be recycled are all considered. The bottle must be explored from every perspective to ensure that we make the bottle the best it can be.” –Stijn Franssen, EMEA R&D Packaging Innovation Manager at Coca-Cola, in an article from BeverageDaily.com, “Coca-Cola reveals paper bottle prototype: ‘This opens up a whole new world of packaging possibilities’”

11/20/20 5:59 AM

Packaging Automation Solutions

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11/20/20 6:01 AM

14 PW DEC2020

FIRST PERSON

A More Sustainable Swiss Miss Conagra Brands, with packaging partner Berry Global, has launched a new cube-shaped container for its Swiss Miss Hot Cocoa line that is made of recyclable polypropylene and an inmold label. Here, Katya Hantel, Sr. Director of Sustainability for Conagra Brands, shares details on the project and how it fits into the companyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s larger sustainability efforts.

Packaging World:

What are your responsibilities as Sr. Director of Sustainability for Conagra Brands?

Katya Hantel: Sustainability at Conagra Brands is a cross-functional effort to bring everyday nourishment to people and the planet through four pillars of activity: Good Food, Responsible Sourcing, Better Planet, and Stronger Communities. Weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re a 100-year-old company with a startup attitudeâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; an imperative to transform how we do business. Category-changing ideas like our Swiss Miss packaging redesign come from insights, ideas, and expertise across our organization, guided by our timeless values of integrity, external focus, broad-mindedness, agility, leadership by all, and a focus on results. As a member of our R&D Leadership Team, my role is to champion the development of more sustainable products across our portfolio of frozen, grocery, and snacks brands, from ingredient source to packaging end-of-life. I partner with sustainability teams and individuals across R&D, Environment, Health and Safety, operations, procurement, human resources, philanthropy, and other areas to bring this vision to life.

How does Conagra select those packages from amongst its portfolio of brands to redesign for greater sustainability? Why was Swiss Miss chosen? We seek to make improvements our customers and consumers want from a performance and sustainability standpoint, while maintaining a rigorous focus on food safety. Our dedication to innovation extends into packaging, and earlier this year we announced a goal to make 100% of current plastic packaging renewable, recyclable, or compostable by 2025. With that goal in mind, we start by examining the business impact that a package redesign will bring and identifying where we can adopt sustainability solutions within our portfolio. In the case of Swiss Miss, our business, R&D teams, and supplier partners saw an opportunity to both reduce the environmental impact of the packaging and provide design solutions that made the product more practical and easier for our customers and consumers to use.

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What were your goals with the new Swiss Miss package? We wanted to unlock new opportunities for growth while prioritizing environmental benefits. This was a chance to evolve consumer and retailer expectations for the category. Round canisters are the conventional shape for cocoa packaging, and we wanted a fresh approach to the design that was better for our customers, our consumers, and the planet.

11/17/20 2:04 PM

Can you describe the new design and why the various elements— e.g., the square shape, the PP material, and an in-mold label—were selected? Traditional round canisters are less convenient to hold and scoop. The cube shape is easier for consumers to grip and pour, it fits better in your pantry, allows for more effective shelving at the store, and is more space-efficient to transport. The lip of the container is flush with the package interior, meaning that there are no awkward attempts to shake out the last bit of cocoa powder from the container. With the in-mold label, the packaging and the label consist of the same material and can therefore be fully recycled. In the end, we wanted a highly distinctive packaging solution that eliminated traditional consumer pain points and increased convenience, functionality, and sustainability.

Development Awards have conserved 3.5 billion gallons of water, decreased our carbon footprint by 189,280 metric tons, and reduced waste by 93,700 tons. We’re proud of the impact we’ve been able to make so far, and the opportunities ahead. —Anne Marie Mohan Read more on the new Swiss Miss container at pwgo.to/5790.

How did Berry Global assist in developing the new container? Our partnership with Berry Global’s design arm, Blue Clover Studios, is based on strong collaboration, innovation, and impact. Right from the start, they helped us embed sustainability measures and principles in our development process without sacrificing aesthetic and stylistic choices. They also helped us think through important end-to-end decisions, from identifying how to maximize shelf capacity at retail to understanding how to best palletize the product. What are the sustainability benefits of this new package? The new package is made from recyclable plastic. And we gain a sustainability benefit from the space-efficient tapered cube design, bringing more canisters into our facility on fewer trucks. These new features reduce the carbon footprint associated with manufacturing and transporting the hot cocoa containers by 15%. How do these advantages fit into Conagra’s overall sustainability vision? For our consumers and employees, our communities, and our planet, Conagra’s commitment is to nourish—to foster community, health, and growth. Nourishing our consumers with good food means providing them choices while meeting our high quality and food-safety standards. And we strive to nourish the planet by sourcing raw ingredients and packaging materials responsibly while generating less waste for disposal, reducing energy use and water use, and helping preserve our forests and other resources. Over the last decade, employee projects submitted for the Conagra Brands Sustainable

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— New IRB 390 Flexpacker Taking picking & packing to the next level IRB 390 FlexPacker is a 4 and 5 axis delta robot that is up to 35% faster with a 45% larger working volume (compared with IRB 360) for enhanced productivity and flexibility. Designed for customers in food & beverage, logistics, pharmaceutical and consumer-packaged goods industries, the new IRB 390 is ideal for secondary packaging and higher payload applications. abb.com/robotics

11/17/20 2:07 PM

16 PW DEC2020

THE LEGAL SIDE

By Eric F. Greenberg, Attorney-at-law

Let’s Play Pundit There are lots of things all Americans agree on. I’m joking of course. Lately, the divided state of America has been rather self-evident. The Presidential election’s over, but roughly half the country is happy, the other half unhappy. Meanwhile, lots of pundit types are furiously analyzing and predicting, so I will offer my 2 cents, too. Five cents, actually. When I say the election’s over, I am implying that I don’t give any weight to the various legal allegations of fraud and a “rigged” election the President and other Republicans have been tossing around in the week or so since voting ended. Take it from a lawyer, there’s a big difference between having enough information sufficient to allow you to Tweet or hold a press conference, where rumors or even speculation will do, and having enough information sufficient to prove, or even properly allege, a legal case to a judge. If I turn out to be wrong, I will admit it loudly in a future column, and as penance will tell embarrassing stories about myself, such as why I had to take my driver’s license test three times. 1. COVID STILL HERE: The pandemic is still here, and at press time was growing larger than it has ever been. President-elect Joe Biden has said he’d take aggressive action against it and has already named his own task force. There’s a lot of attention to its effects on businesses, in addition to effects on health. Interestingly, although the COVID-19 pandemic shut down or damaged many businesses of various types and sizes, many contract packaging and manufacturing businesses have found their business increasing during recent months, probably due to upticks in stay-athome activities and meals, online gifting, consumers stocking up in preparation for possible shortages, and other influences. Industry data has shown an increase in contract packaging and manufacturing of 11.7% Compound Annual Growth Rate over the last five years, including the pandemic era. 2. NEW LAWS? ONLY MAYBE: Biden has already emphasized that he will take a different approach to addressing various topics, including environmental, infrastructure, taxes, and COVID, but if any of his plans require new or different laws, that is, Congressional action, and thus he’s probably dreaming. I don’t expect the still-Republicancontrolled U.S. Senate to become suddenly cooperative with Democrats. There’s some chance the two runoff elections in Georgia, set for early January, could shift control of the Senate to Democrats, and if that happens, new laws become more of a possibility. 3. NEW REGULATIONS? MORE LIKELY: If it’s changes to regulations that Biden wants, he’ll have more ability to make those than changes to laws. It’s always a good idea to eliminate or change regulatory programs that aren’t effective. My pet peeve with the often-touted Trump program to “reduce regulations” was that it

spoke about regulations as if they were pests that are always bad for business and for people, so that simply cutting the number of them was a good idea, regardless of what they did or why they were made in the first place. I have heard the President tout his reductions of regulations dozens of times, and never once heard him mention the subject matters of the regulations involved, but it appears a lot of the regulations his administration eliminated (or tried to) involved environmental requirements about air and water quality. It may seem like governments can do whatever they want with regulations, but that’s not quite so. Federal law requires changes to regulations or the making of new ones, except in emergencies, to follow a specified proposal/public comments/finalization process. Courts will strike down regulations if the agency doesn’t follow those steps or doesn’t articulate rational reasons for what they do, or if the courts find their actions to be “arbitrary” or “capricious.” A new administration with a general philosophy in favor of the occasional regulation on any topic could mean we’ll see more complexities for business, perhaps also, finally, progress on cannabis regulation, that could provide more certainty and loosen up markets for packaging and labeling. Remember too that while businesses usually don’t like the idea of new regulatory requirements, the more the federal government regulates, the less individual states are likely to do so, with their potentially more-burdensome and non-uniform approaches. What we might see is not so much changing laws or regulations, but big changes resulting from agencies simply reordering their priorities, emphasizing or de-emphasizing development of new programs or enforcement of specific requirements. 4. EXECUTIVE ORDERS? YES, AND ALREADY: Presidential executive orders can be made whenever the President wants to issue them, though many of them are more symbolic than substantive, and it’s not unusual for one President to issue orders that have the opposite substance, or form, than a prior President’s orders. In fact, Biden has said already that he will sign orders that will reverse what President Trump did and recommit the U.S. to the Paris environmental accords, and rejoin the World Health Organization, so if those are bad for your business, expect headaches to return. 5. NOW WHAT?: There’s been so much commentary about how at-odds the American public is, and it’s clear that it’s deeper than merely one’s opinion of Donald Trump. Philosophies of the role of government are behind a lot of the divide, and alas part of the divide is due to too many people taking their cues from batty conspiracy theories. Nevertheless, I am completely confident that we can make it through this. A good start would be remembering Abraham Lincoln’s formula for our nation after the Civil War, “With malice toward none, with charity for all….” PW

Eric Greenberg can be reached at greenberg@efg-law.com. Or visit his firm’s Web site at www.ericfgreenbergpc.com. INFORMATIONAL ONLY, NOT LEGAL ADVICE.

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11/17/20 3:54 PM

18 PW DEC2020

THE BIG PICTURE

By Sterling Anthony, CPP, Contributing Editor

Reduce Package Design’s Liability With Failure Mode and Effects Analysis correction/prevention, and responsibilities are interrelated. Take, as Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA), as the name implies, an example, a failure mode deemed to be caused by a critical defect. evaluates potential failures and their potential effects. It further If the critical defect is a design defect—meaning inherent to the evaluates the cause of failure, the likelihood of failure, how failure is design—then cause, likelihood, detection, and severity will have been to be detected, the severity of the effect(s), corrections/preventions, answered. Corrections/prevention should be pursued in accordance and the assignment of responsibilities. with the three-step hierarchy of safety engineering. Step One is to The FMEA model can be applied to any component of the eliminate the defect through redesign. Step Two is to implement systems concept of packaging, including: raw materials, converting, safeguards if elimination isn’t feasible. Step Three is to compose manufacturing, design, testing, filling, unitizing, distribution, effective warnings against whatever survives the preceding steps. At sustainability, and disposal. Of those components, design is most the end of the steps, the package must be judged to be reasonably often cited in product liability suits, and the remainder of this article safe. Otherwise, it should not be put into the will address FMEA from that perspective. commercial stream. FMEA is a multi-discipline, multi-faceted FMEA is not a With failure modes that are team undertaking. Members thus need to one-and-done proposition; manufacturing defects, cause, detection, operate under the right analytical framework, and correction/prevention reside in quality starting with the question, “what does failure the same design should assurance measures, which, themselves, mean as applied to package design?” be reevaluated if changing should undergo separate FMEAs. Severity can It means that the design falls short in range, including effects that trigger lawsuits. fulfilling one or more of its functions, namely circumstances warrant. With failure modes that are marketing containment, protection, communication, or defects, the cause, detection, and correction/prevention require convenience/utility. How might the design fail containment, whether knowing what constitutes an adequate warning. An inadequate by an all-at-once escape of the contents or by gradual leak? How warning is equivalent to there being no warning. Warnings need the design might fail to protect the product’s integrity is a certain to be evaluated on content and format, i.e. what’s communicated consideration, but so is protection of property and people. How and how it’s presented. Content should consist of a signal word (e.g. might the design fail communication, by not conveying needed safety WARNING), identification of the hazard, instructions on avoiding the information? How might the design fail convenience/utility by not hazard, and emergency contact information. Format, as to placement, making the user experience as safe as feasible? should render the warning conspicuous among surrounding graphics All of the preceding failures are defects, but of varying effects. and text. Likelihood and severity should be the main determinants Defects are classified as minor, major, and critical. A minor defect as to how inclusive a warning should be, given the impracticality of is slight, cosmetic, and otherwise does not affect function. A major warning about every conceivable possibility. defect does affect function. A critical defect is hazardous/dangerous Responsibilities should be assigned in accordance with and can cause injury and death. Critical defects are the type most associated expertise. Failures due to design defects and those due to likely to lead to product liability suits. That’s not to suggest that the manufacturing defects should be assigned to technical personnel. other types shouldn’t be taken seriously, because minor and major Failures due to marketing defects can also require technical expertise, defects, committed consistently, result in loss of customers. in addition to marketing expertise and legal expertise. Imaginative, probing thought is called for in identifying potential If a FMEA wasn’t done before a design was commercialized, it failure modes. That’s especially true of team members whose can be done subsequently. FMEA is not a one-and-done proposition; familiarity with a package design might cloud their objectivity. the same design should be reevaluated if changing circumstances And analysis should not stop with the identification of a “worst warrant. Neither is FMEA a stand-alone proposition; an evaluation case scenario,” because lesser scenarios can generate lawsuits. The performed on design can prompt evaluations in other components question should be, what failures are reasonably foreseeable along of the packaging system. It all makes for a considerable investment the spectrum of possibilities? Such thinking should include reasonably of resources. However, it can prove worth it to a company that finds foreseeable product misuse by consumers. itself named as Defendant in a lawsuit. PW For a given failure mode, causes, likelihood, detection, severity,

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11/17/20 2:09 PM

What if used food packaging never became litter?

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11/17/20 2:10 PM 23/10/2020 12.03

20 PW DEC2020

SUSTAINABLE PACKAGING

By Anne Marie Mohan, Senior Editor

Unilever Launches its Largest Ever Refill Trial In late October, U.K. supermarket chain Asda relaunched its Middleton store in Leeds as a pioneering flagship sustainability store comprising a Refill Zone supported by Unilever and U.K. beauty products company Beauty Kitchen, which is known for its “Return, Refill, Repeat” program. Unilever is a lead partner in Asda’s trial providing seven of its household brands, including Persil laundry detergent, PG Tips tea,

• In-home refills: Cif ecorefills offer an in-home refill experience, and the store will provide shoppers with an entire bay dedicated to the 10X concentrated refills for sprays that will allow them to use a Cif spray bottle for life. Ecorefills use 75% less plastic than the standard cleaning bottle, which results in 87% fewer trucks on the road. An entire fixture of 10X-concentrated spray cleaners across the Asda estate could save 990 tonnes of plastic every year. • Self-serve containers: Unilever tea brands PG Tips and Pukka will be available through self-serve containers or “hoppers” for loose tea and tongs to self-dispense fully biodegradable teabags. Shoppers will be able to take their own reusable container into the store or can buy one there. Once their container is full, they take it to the weighing station where a label is printed, ready for payment at the checkout.

Radox shower gel, Cif household cleaning items, Simple liquid handwash, Pukka tea, and Alberto Balsam shampoo and conditioner. Trialing three different refill formats, this is the largest project of its kind for Unilever in Europe, the company says, providing a real-world “test and learn,” to understand what works best for consumers in a retail environment. The three different refill models being trialed inside the store are: • Touch-free refill machines developed by Beauty Kitchen: Beauty and personal care brands Radox, Simple, and Alberto Balsam, along with Persil laundry liquid will be dispensed in reusable aluminum or stainless steel bottles via three machines using the Return, Refill, Repeat premise. First-time shoppers will be provided with a bottle, while returning shoppers will reuse their existing bottle. Once the bottle is filled, shoppers add their printed label to the bottle and take it to checkout as usual. Each bottle has a unique QR code, a feature that will enable full traceability of each bottle, allowing Unilever to track the full buy/ use/refill process and gain better insight into the circular model. According to Unilever, together these three Refill Stations could save the equivalent of 30,000 plastic water bottles in just one store in one year, based on a 500-mL bottle size and predicted sales of Persil, Radox, Alberto Balsam, and Simple refills.

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Says Sebastian Munden, Executive Vice President of Unilever UK & Ireland, “I am very excited by the potential to test and learn from this fantastic partnership with Asda. It’s a great opportunity for us to find out, across seven of our leading brands, just how shoppers respond to using refillable and reusable packaging in-store. We are all committed to driving lasting change when it comes to plastic, but to do so we must create scalable solutions and make it as easy as possible for people to make sustainable choices. On our journey to halving our use of virgin plastic by 2025, we will have to be bold and totally rethink products and packaging, and we will only do that by testing a range of solutions with shoppers in real-life conditions.” Adds Beauty Kitchen founder Jo Chidley, “The need to act on the plastic pollution crisis is urgent, and focusing consumer behavior on sustainability and cradle-to-cradle practices is a vital part of the solution. This exciting partnership to power Refill Stations is a pivotal point in creating a sustainable future and instilling a reuse mindset.” PW

Jumpstart on demand Learn more about sustainable packaging, along with a host of other on-trend packaging topics presented during the recent PACK EXPO Connects Jumpstart sessions, at packexpoconnects.com.

11/20/20 11:01 AM

Journalists you should know

Keeping you informed about what matters in packaging–

Q&A with Matt Reynolds Among the features you covered recently, what stands out? “Sustainability casts the longest and widest shadow at the moment. Every stakeholder —from retailers to brands to their OEM and packaging material suppliers, converters and onward—is at a different spot on the great sustainability learning curve. Two other similarly omnipresent topics are e-commerce and the closely intertwined workforce/ automation dynamic. Both (or all three, depending on your view) cut obliquely across the horizontal packaging industry, affecting the verticals within to varying degrees.” When you’re not focused on packaging, how do spend your time? “I wouldn’t trade living in Chicago for anything, but for my wife and me, city life requires a relief valve. Getting away usually means she’s paddling and I’m ﬁshing somewhere in the upper Midwest, well North of the line where farms and oaks give way to pines and lakes. Winters just mean I’m ﬁshing through a little bit harder water.”

A seasoned B2B journalist and well-respected within the packaging community, Matt Reynolds became Editor of Packaging World in 2018.

Matt Reynolds. Worth following. Packworld.com

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PMMI.org/podcasts

LinkedIn.com/in/mreynoldspw

11/20/20 11:02 AM

22 PW DEC2020

COVID-19 Test Medium Production Ramped Up By 20,000% in Six Months Viral Transport Media tubes filled with liquid media are used to store and transport nasal swabs for viruses including COVID-19. Sixteen integrated lines were designed, built, and installed in 20 weeks to meet demand. WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

Virtual FAT

Expedited validation timelines

CE standard

By Keren Sookne, Director of Editorial Content, Healthcare Packaging Magazine “Nimble” is an understatement for most life science manufacturers producing COVID-19 test materials, PPE, or treatment this year. Thermo Fisher Scientific snapped into action and began ramping up production of its viral transport media (VTM) tubes at the outset of the pandemic. Later they received orders from the U.S. government to scale production from 50,000/week to 10 million/week. VTM tubes filled with liquid medium are used to store and transport nasal swabs for viruses including SARS-CoV-2. In March, the Thermo Fisher facility in Lenexa, Kan., was already filling 10- and 15-mL conical tube configurations. The company ramped to 24/7 operation and retrofitted their lines to run faster at the outset of the pandemic, but it was clear that they needed new machines to meet demand. Considerations beyond speed included: • Some of the conical tubes are skirted, but the tubes without skirting do not stand up on their own. VTM tubes filled with liquid medium are used to store and transport nasal swabs for • The medium has similar viscosity to water, viruses including SARS-CoV-2. but Jason Gourley, Strategic Projects, Sr. or labeler—equipment could bind up and cause downtime in cleaning. Project Engineer at Thermo Fisher Scientific, says, “From a filling VTM lines also needed to be ramped up at Thermo Fisher’s sites perspective it’s very similar to water, but if it lands on a surface, in Perth, Scotland, and Wesel, Germany. In both Perth and Wesel, the drips, or spills and begins to dry, it becomes sticky. If it’s not imoperation switches between filling VTM and saline, depending on curmediately wiped or cleaned, it turns into a goo, similar to spilled rent demand. Gourley explains, “It’s the same tube and cap, same fill soda left to dry.” size. The difference is the liquid itself, the labeling requirements, and This didn’t cause issues with capping, but if a tube happened to different pump settings.” spill and medium got on other components—such as the feed screws

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11/18/20 11:42 AM

System details

From a filling perspective the medium is very similar to water, but if it lands on a surface, drips, or spills and begins to dry, it becomes sticky. When Gourley arrived in Lenexa from his usual Rockford, Ill. facility in March, the immediate need was to understand the process and determine where automation could increase throughput dramatically. Speed was key. The Thermo Fisher project team had vendors offering to drive components to the facility—instead of overnight or two-day shipping—because they knew every hour counted. Gourley suggested working with Morrison Container Handling Solutions for high speed integrated lines. “I’ve worked with Morrison for about three or four years. They’ve done some screw feeds and integration with a line in Rockford.” The initial query to Morrison was to learn whether they could create a smaller system within approximately a week. “They immediately hopped on it and followed through. They had a quote ready the next day, working through the night and everything,” he says. Some projects take a step-wise approach to implementation. But Gourley says time didn’t allow for that in this case, noting, “This was all at once. We drew it out on a napkin one morning. The next morning, we were putting it together.” It was difficult to nail down project specifics with a constantly moving target. “Every day something changed. One million per week was the initial goal and it was only going to be for about three or four months,” Gourley says. “Everything started out with, ‘Maybe. But could you do it?’ We had four on order and then the question came down from the government on how we can get 10 million a week and what would it take.” The original order for machine #1 was placed in early April and it shipped in approximately five weeks. That included design from scratch to manufacturing, build/assembly, and testing. A total of 14 systems shipped to Lenexa and two systems shipped overseas in the next 20 weeks. To put things in perspective, the normal quoted lead time for one system/line can be 20 weeks or more.

COVID19_Vaccine.indd 23

The Morrison systems allow Thermo Fisher to orient, contain, move, and support the pointed conical tubes. They are handled from a dual feeder bowl solution to drop into the screws. R-Tech Feeders Inc. based in Rockford, supplied the tube elevators, feeder bowls, and shuttle dropping mechanism for the tubes into the Morrison screws. The system then indexes six tubes at a time underneath the filling head, indexes along underneath the cap applicator, and then into a spindle capper. APEX Filling Systems in Michigan City, Ind., supplied the cap sorters and cappers. Fill and torque checks are performed by production every 15 minutes. There is also a no-cap sensor and crooked cap sensor at the discharge of the machine. If a cap issue is detected, the machine will stop, alert the operator to remove that tube, and then the operator is able to reset and start the machine. Every second counts when running at a rate between 120-132 ppm. Tubes exit the machine in different orientations based on the machine and location. • Machines #1 and #2 run pointed tubes which don’t stand on their own. • Machines #3 through #16 run skirted tubes that technically have the ability to stand on their own, but Gourley notes that even the skirted tubes—moving at rate, with liquid—do not stand securely on their own. Dorner Conveyors move tubes directly from the machine, out of the cleanroom to the labeling machine, autofeeding onto the labeler. There is still an operator to perform quality checks or interventions at the labeler. Label applicators are supplied by Missouri-based Pack Leader USA.

Remote installation As many business travelers have found, travel restrictions have held up some trips. Gourley says, “Between Chicago and Lenexa, there were still restrictions, but we had higher level approvals due to the critical needs of the project.”

The Morrison systems allow Thermo Fisher to orient, contain, move, and support the pointed conical tubes.

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24 PW DEC2020

For the sites in Europe, it was a different story. “For Scotland, we tried to go through the embassy and the government to get those supporting individuals on-site in Chicago around the 4th of July weekend, to review their machine at Morrison and to be a part of an installation in Lenexa. But we weren’t able to get approval prior to their machine arriving at their site,” he explains. Gourley and his colleagues performed all 16 factory acceptance tests (FATs) on-site at Morrison. The company performed/recorded virtual FATs for the European sites. He says, “For the first two, we developed/ worked through a protocol and had it circulated for approval, so we knew what we were looking for. But we also had timeline restrictions— we already had the plane booked. There’s only so many tubes we could run and only so much time we had with the new system.”

Interested in Virtual FATs? Check out the latest best practices, learnings, and protocols as documented and curated by PMMI’s OpX Leadership Network, at pwgo.to/5808

Every second counts when running at a rate between 120-132 ppm.

Both Perth and Wesel received their machines with only instructions, videos, and the ability to call for support. Yet each site respectively had their first machine received, installed, and running at rate in five to six days. By then, Lenexa staff had installed about seven machines in the U.S., so they had plenty of lessons learned, videos, PowerPoints, instructions on the sequence, and items to pay attention to. “We were a part of the complete build, the complete runoff, and the complete disassembly in

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creating these specific systems. We went through rolls and rolls of blue tape, putting on notes, alignment features, noting all the dimensions, After ramping up 20,000%, you might think it would be time to relax. anything we learned from the first several machines. It is wild to think The facility in Lenexa now has 14 lines installed (as of Aug. 25), with the that we shipped machines around the world to sites that had never capacity to produce 10 million VTM tubes/week. physically seen or ran the equipment. A lot of thanks go to those receivBut the work continues. Thermo Fisher has ordered 14 more systems ing individuals for their patience and perseverance,” Gourley says. —four for Lenexa and 10 for Scotland. “A lot of credit goes to the teams 2 7/21/20 10:26 AM The company made use of Microsoft’s HoloLens program for live LA102-Half-Page-Island-Spread-2.pdf at Morrison and supporting vendors to start from scratch and build 30 video feeds from the augmented reality headsets. “We were able to see their troubleshooting issues live, and they were able to live-view their machine during validation and ask as many questions as possible. We built up the files and everything to have immediately available, so if they had a question and they were viewing it right in their headset, I had the pictures, dimensions, and videos available to pull right onto their screen and into their viewpoint to do a direct comparison,” Gourley explains.

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One of the toughest parts of the remote work was not the machine integration itself, but the time differences between sites—six hours to Perth and seven hours to Wesel. Which site worked during business hours and which worked off-shifts? “Everybody did everything. It was 24-hour support,” he says. The largest regulatory hurdle that they had to overcome was making sure they met all the CE mark requirements—mandatory for equipment in Europe to demonstrate safety conformance—for the Perth and Wesel units. Gourley says, “As soon as possible, we brought in a third party to fully understand the CE standards and additional safety requirements. We immediately started talking with both sites’ environmental health and safety teams to ensure that we were going to comply not only with CE, but also be aligned with their site safety expectations.”

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systems between March and the end of the year. It was really a team effort with a lot of credit to Thermo Fisher personnel—including the engineering and procurement groups—between R Tech, Apex, and many sub-contractors. There was definitely a lot of collaboration,” he says. It’s too soon to really talk efficiency, particularly with the rapid increase in staffing and training, but they are averaging over 100 tubes/ min per machine. Gourley explains, “The machines run very well and

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they’re well over the OEE that we were anticipating. Now we’ve gotten the initial kinks out of the way and the operators are a lot more familiar with the operation.”

Staff and facility expansions Understandably, Thermo Fisher ran into space issues, especially as they looked at the supply chain to get tubes, caps, and media to the machine. “Machine #1 is a much smaller footprint than Machines #2 through #16—it’s shorter in height, length, and width to fit in the room. It’s still a screw feeder, but the cap delivery, and exit are different,” he says. When they ran out of space in the existing facility, they needed to build out an entire second facility in Lenexa for filling lines, packaging, and more. Over 300 new employees were hired and the site is looking to hire over 100 more additional employees. The new $40 million facility is strictly dedicated to VTM production and quality control, and it will serve a role going forward for flu and other viral products. Deemed Project Patriot, the 120,000 sq ft build-out and tube production can be viewed in action at pwgo.to/5792. “When we signed the lease on May 18th, this was an empty shell, and by July 4th, our country’s Independence Day—our milestone for Project Patriot—the first production units coming off the line were achieved,” said Bret Johnson, vice president of global operations for Thermo Fisher’s specialty diagnostics business.

Key takeaways and next steps The Lenexa team learned a lot along the way, especially with Machine #1 since it was a completely new system in some ways for Thermo Fisher, Morrison, and everyone involved. “For Machine #2 through #16, we took a ton of lessons learned and worked to implement on the fly. We’ve gone back and implemented some on #1 also,” says Gourley. The collaboration between Morrison, Thermo Fisher, and other vendors was key. He adds, “We were getting the Morrison machine ready on Monday, receiving vendor components on Tuesday, running the full system on Wednesday, and FAT-ing and shipping on Thursday and Friday. At one point we shipped three systems in one week and one of them was international.” The team continues to investigate more streamlined processes and automation to help aid in inspection and packaging. Currently operators perform a visual inspection for media content and cap, and check for wrinkles, damage, and legibility of the label. Then tubes are passed to an operator who populates 72-count boxes in Lenexa. Each machine produces a lot of approximately 24,000 tubes every three and a half to four hours— about a pallet and a half worth of material. At peak, with 12 machines running, it’s a pallet approximately every four minutes, so there’s considerable volume to

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After inspection, tubes are passed to an operator to fill 72-count boxes in Lenexa. handle thanks to the new machines. Gourley comments, “The Morrison machines, along with the efforts of all of the other vendors, and all of the dedication of the Thermo Fisher individuals were key in enabling us to deliver on the federal government contract. Overall, we’ve met our commitment with a lot hard work and with everybody invested 110% in making these test kits available for society.” PW

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Colgate: Packaging’s Day Has Come Colgate-Palmolive has made sustainable packaging a key priority. From recyclable toothpaste tubes to aluminum bottles for mouthwash, they’re locked in on eliminating plastic waste and delighting consumers. WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

Material science development

E-Commerce packaging

Pat Reynolds, VP Editor Emeritus “Packaging is a field whose day has come.” That simple and straightforward statement by Colgate-Palmolive’s Chief Technology Officer Patricia Verduin neatly sums up the views shared by all five of the Colgate executives I talked with recently in preparing this year’s View from the Top feature. “It’s always been viewed as an applied engineering field, if you will,” Verduin continues in her assessment of packaging’s status. “But I think this is an age where packaging changes the way the world buys products, whether it’s making E-Commerce a great experience or it’s addressing the whole plastic waste issue. More than ever before, it’s changing the way people engage with our brands. From Colgate to Tom’s of Maine to Fabuloso to Hill’s, the packaging has to deliver against the promise of our brands and our company purpose as a caring, innovative growth company reimagining a healthier future for all people, their pets, and our planet.” Working out of Colgate’s Piscataway, N.J., Global Technology Campus, Verduin oversees global R&D, Packaging, and Design. “These are the arms and legs of innovation, the people who are really doing innovation with their pencils and CAD drawings and knowledge,” says Verduin. Noting that this organizational structure has only been in place for a few years, she says it’s really been powerful to have all three of these functional groups together. “It’s all about having the product formulators, the brand designers, the user experience people, and the packaging engineers and developers all in the same room at the same time and all developing against a common brief,” says Verduin. “Too often in the past the practice was to make the formula and throw it over the wall to the packaging people, who, when they’d come up with a package, would toss it over to the

In a category where the plastic blisterpack is the dominant packaging format, the launch of Colgate Keep in a wet-fiber thermoformed package made of sugarcane and wood fiber was notable to say the least. Shown here is the front of the starter kit and the back of the two-count refill pack.

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design team for graphics. It just doesn’t work that way anymore. The formulas are too complicated and the delivery mechanisms too varied.” Colgate-Palmolive is a global company that competes in the oral care, home care, personal care, and pet nutrition categories. With sales of nearly $16 billion, the company supplies products to more than 200 countries and territories and has 40+ manufacturing facilities worldwide, each with its own team of engineers. Like most Consumer Packaged Goods companies, Colgate places a premium on both innovation and sustainability. Somewhat atypically, however, the firm doesn’t have one director of packaging innovation and another of sustainability. Instead, it has a Director of Global Packaging Innovation and Sustainability, the title held by Greg Corra. When asked why things are organized this way, he has this to say: “We believe packaging innovation is the key to achieving Colgate’s purpose of reimagining a healthier future and that our sustainability strategy needs to underpin all aspects of our packaging strategy.” “Underpin” is a bit of an understatement. The extent to which sustainability shapes all things packaging at Colgate is evident if we look at some of the packages recently introduced by the New York-based firm. Many of these are packages for oral care products, which should come as no surprise. Colgate’s largest category, oral care represented 46% of the firm’s sales in 2019. Let’s start with toothbrushes, since Colgate sells about 3 billion of them every year, two-thirds of them made in-house.

Replaceable heads Just reaching U.S. consumers this winter is Colgate Keep, a line of replaceable-head manual toothbrushes featuring an aluminum handle that’s designed to be long lasting for 80% less plastic waste. A new replacement head can be snapped on when bristles are worn. Colgate is launching both a starter kit, which has the aluminum handle with two brush heads, as well as a two-count refill pack sans handle. The concept of a more permanent and reusable handle made of aluminum is in itself a significant step toward putting less plastic into the solid waste stream. But our interest here is in the fiber-based packaging, which, in a category dominated almost exclusively by plastic blister-packs, is a profound departure. “The first challenge in our brief was ‘Hey, guys, we need to get out of a plastic blister,’” says Strategic Brand Design Manager Jada Britto. “That led, of course, to a series of questions about the options. How can we use fiber? Can we use recyclable paper? How do we still get premium finish and color? We really had to challenge our external partners to help us find the answers.” Britto says that her particular responsibility in projects like this is the look, tone, and feel of the package. “It’s all about how to treat the master brand,” she notes. “Then I work closely with our industrial designers to execute on the design intent.” The package that emerged for the Keep starter kit is a peggable allfiber tub and lid that stands 229 mm tall, 70 mm wide, and 26 mm deep (9.01 x 2.75 x 1.02 in.). Sourced from sugarcane and wood fiber, the tub is wet-fiber thermoformed by China’s LVHE Packaging Technology Co. Ltd., an impressive specialist in researching, manufacturing, and marketing biodegradable materials and products. The lid, a 400 gsm paperboard containing 60% recycled content, is heat sealed to the tub. Graphics are printed UV offset in six colors plus a matte varnish.

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Colgate’s Whitening Pen debuted in E-Commerce channels. A good example of a SIOC (Ships in Own Container), its packaging is entirely paperboard, including an inner tray made of 100% compostable PaperFoam. As for putting the products into the packs, this is done for now by an outside contractor in a semi-automated process. The starter kit sells for $9.99 and the replacement pack for $4.99. “From start to launch, including the time we had to spend exploring material options, it took about eight months,” says Britto. “We’re getting faster with getting these things out the door.” Elsewhere in the oral care category is another brand new product called Optic White Overnight Teeth Whitening Pen. The product itself is a 2.5-mL aluminum and plastic cylinder in an injection-molded stand. Packaging, once again, is entirely paperboard, including an inner tray made of 100% compostable PaperFoam. Based in the Netherlands but with manufacturing facilities in countries including the U.S., PaperFoam mixes four bio-based ingredients into a thick paste that is then injected into a custom aluminum mold and baked at about 400 deg F. The manufacturing process is said to be energy-efficient, and the resulting part provides the cushioning properties of plastic foam alternatives but is TUV-certified as compostable in home or industrial settings and is UL-validated as recyclable. The other packaging component for the whitening pen is a 24-point SBS sleeve with two locking tabs. The inner tray holding the pen and stand slides into this sleeve. Supplied by Multi-Pack Solutions, it’s offset printed in seven colors with a foil stamp plus varnish. “We definitely focused on a recycled paperboard,” says Britto. “And the cold foil accents bring a nice element of premiumness without interfering with recyclability.” When asked if the team ever thought about a clear package for the whitening pen, considering how consumers respond to product visibility, Britto says, “I wouldn’t say we never considered it, but from the perspective of graphic impact it would have had its limitations. This printed paperboard says Colgate Red. Also, when I thought about ECommerce, I wanted the package to stand out in a sea of blues and whites. I really wanted that color. And I wanted that curved shape, even though it complicates a number of things compared to a simple rectangular carton. We almost bailed on the curve at one point, but we pushed ahead and solved it because it delivers on the premium experience that we were after.”

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Ships In Own Container

FOCKE

Since the whitening pen debuted as an E-Commerce item, Colgate Director of E-Commerce Bruce Cummings was a key contributor on the team behind its development. “Early on, we considered a carton into a corrugated box,” says Cummings. “But by launch we’d come up with the red mailer, which is lighter and has that easy-open tear strip. Then comes the Colgate-Red sleeve, out of which the inner foam tray smoothly slides out. Compact and compelling, it’s an experience that resembles an elegant process of unboxing.” Cummings says the team would have gone with a paper mailer rather than the polypropylene air-filled wrap had COVID-19 not messed with the supply chain as it did. “The idea is that once the unboxing experience is complete the consumer can put all of the packaging into the paper recycle stream,” notes Cummings. He adds that the paper mailer is now in the works. This package is an example of a SIOC (Ships In Own Container) that is sent from Colgate’s contract manufacturer to the Amazons of the world in a corrugated case of 24 units. Each unit, of course, consists of pen in holder, inner foam tray, instruction booklet, outer paperboard sleeve, and mailer. The Amazons of the world apply the last piece of packaging onto the mailer: a thermal-transfer-printed pressure-sensitive label that has all the information needed to get the unit to Mr. Smith at 810 S. Main St. Another nice example of a Colgate SIOC for the E-Commerce chanPS x 5_4375 01RZ vek.pdf 31.08.20 10:22 nelAZis PMMI what9Cummings refers to as the1 Smile Box. Like the mailer used for the whitening pen, both Colgate Red and the smile component are

A SIOC designed specifically for E-Commerce, the Smile Box holds up to four cartons of toothpaste. used prominently on this corrugated packaging that holds three cartons of toothpaste. Currently the package is a single-wall B-flute corrugated printed flexo in one color Colgate Red by WestRock. This represents a downgauging compared to the original structure, which was a C-flute. And according to Cummings, a third iteration is currently being evaluated. This kind of ongoing optimization, he notes, is fundamental to Colgate’s approach to packaging regardless of which channel it’s designed for. “I like to say that we need to continue versioning so that we can arrive at better solutions,” says Cummings. But as much as downgauging and cost-optimization are vigorously pursued, he emphasizes this: “We never compromise where quality standards are concerned. We don’t want people getting a tube that leaks or a dog food pack that’s been punctured.”

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Aluminum bottle A very different kind of container was developed by Colgate for a brand new mouthwash called Swish. It’s an impact-extruded aluminum bottle from Trivium Packaging with a 38-mm threaded closure. It’s designed to stand apart from the ubiquitous plastic containers in which mouth wash is so typically found, and the messaging printed on the sidewall proudly proclaims “Refreshingly thoughtful: forever recyclable aluminum bottle.” Available in stores and online, the 16-oz bottle sells for about $6.00. “It’s a beautiful package, isn’t it?” says Verduin, though in the next sentence she confesses it brought her a few extra gray hairs. One challenge the development team faced involved the essential oils in some of the flavorings. As originally formulated, these oils reacted unfavorably with the internal coating of the container, so the product formulas had to be modified.

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The push for monomaterials Intriguing as the above initiatives may be, the area of emphasis staked out by Colgate that may be the most fascinating—not to mention challenging—is the development of monomaterials that score sustainability points because they fit neatly into an already established recycle stream. Notable progress has been made in pouches for Hill’s Pet Nutrition pet food treats and in toothpaste tubes. Since Colgate is

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Jose Luis Molinar, Global Packaging Director Personal & Home Care, views the launch of Swish from a filling line perspective. He describes the project as “a smart combination of existing assets, new assets, and a commitment to making it happen. “We are filling this on an existing line used for plastic bottles in our factory in Tennessee,” he continues. “But two things have to be done differently. The automated unscrambling and feeding system used for plastic could damage the aluminum bottles, so we are feeding them into the filling system manually. Also, because the bottle won’t withstand the top-load pressure of the rotary capper that was on the line, we needed to install a new capper.” The ROPP rotary capper is from Zalkin.

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Key contributors to the work Colgate has done on the monomaterial recyclable tube project include (left to right): Tom Heaslip, Worldwide Director, Category Packaging; Jennifer Noll Waxman, Director E2E Program Management; Jennifer Boada-Rodriguez, Senior Technical Associate; Anne Bedarf, Packaging Sustainability Manager; and Jun Wang, Senior Technical Associate. the world’s biggest toothpaste producer, let’s begin with the tubes in which all that toothpaste is packaged. When the Tom’s of Maine brand reached store shelves earlier this year in a monomaterial recyclable tube, it was the culmination of a five-year effort. The Colgate technology represents the first oral care or personal care tube to earn recognition for recyclability from the Association of Plastic Recyclers. Popular in a variety of product categories, laminated tubes for toothpaste alone number an estimated 20 billion annually around the world. In most of these tubes, a layer of aluminum is included in the multilayer lamination to protect the toothpaste’s flavor and fluoride. It’s this laminated combination of dissimilar materials that makes it just about impossible to cost effectively recycle such materials through established methods. To make a recyclable tube, Colgate first eliminated the layer of aluminum, says Director of Packaging Innovation and Sustainability Corra. “The other innovation,” he says, “was changing the resin specification from a mix of LLDPE and HDPE to mostly HDPE. The tricky part was getting the specs of the resins for the multiple layers to work well to make a flat sheet. Remember, our goal was to be able to make these tubes at scale. Had we only been after a prototype or a lab sample, it would have been another story. What we needed was a nice flat sheet that we

First to appear in Colgate’s monomaterial recyclable tube was the Tom’s of Maine brand, but now Smile for Good in Europe and Natural Extracts in Latin America have also been converted. By end of this year, Colgate Optic White in sizes above 3 oz will take advantage of this technology. The goal is to have all of the firm’s toothpaste in this recyclable tube by 2025.

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can print on and form into tubes at our current rates. So that was the key innovation on the lamination side. And then on the shoulder of the tube it was a matter of switching from a much higher melt index to a lower melt index so that we’re compatible with the well-established HDPE recycle stream.” As in the past, the injection-molded shoulder is heat sealed to the tube body. The development team at Colgate’s Piscataway Global Technology Center tested a dozen different combinations, using from six to 20 layers, to find the recipe that allows people to comfortably squeeze out all the toothpaste, protects the integrity of the product, and meets the demands of high-speed production. The product protection component now that aluminum has been eliminated is EVOH. Corra notes that either of two approaches can be taken. The entire tube material can be coextrusion blown in a single pass or multiple layers of blown HDPE can be extrusion laminated to a blown coextrusion that includes EVOH. One other dynamic to keep in mind is how vertically integrated Colgate is when it comes to the toothpaste tube business. In other words, they don’t just fill and cap the tubes, they make a whole lot of the tubes, too. “That made it interesting,” notes Corra, “because as the developer of the new package we couldn’t just beat a supplier down on cost or delivery. The supply chain boss who owns that tube-making equipment is my colleague. But it wound up being a very good partnership. Our China factory that does the lamination is one of our centers of excellence for tube forming, and the people there were all in when it came to getting it right.” When asked about the relative cost of the recyclable tube, Corra says that parity is the goal. “We have a long track record of cost-optimizing tubes and we fully believe in our ability to get the cost of this one where we need it to be,” he says. “That was always in the design brief, as was scalability. Remember, in time we’ll be making billions of these.”

Colgate chooses to share its technology Notably, so will the competition. In spite of all that Colgate has invested in bringing this tube to market, it is sharing the technology

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openly with any and all who choose to use it. John Standish, Technical Director at the Association of Plastic Recyclers, applauds this move. “With Colgate sharing technology, others will be able to offer recyclecompatible tubes faster and at lower development time and cost,” says Standish. “It’s a great pioneering effort from Colgate that shows real industry leadership.” Corra and colleagues believe that sharing the monomaterial technology is the best way to ensure the long-term market viability of this solution. “Having gotten a recyclable tube over the finish line, it only makes sense to help others get there,” says Corra. “If our tube is going to be recycled, it’s going to be because all tubes are recyclable. We get that. We also understand clearly that developing sustainable packaging is a marathon, not a sprint. We have a lot of work to do, and it’s not just in changing consumers’ behavior so that they are actively engaged with the idea of recycling these tubes. We also are working with the Municipal Recycling Facilities so that when consumers do put packaging materials into the correct bin, those materials actually find their way to the right place so that they can in fact get recycled.” Since the Tom’s of Maine launch, Colgate now has brought the monomaterial tube to a 75-mL Colgate Smile for Good brand in Europe and both 90- and 120-g sizes of its Natural Extracts brand in Latin America. By the end of this year North America will see the new material in the Colgate Optic White brand in sizes above 3 oz and in the 4.2-oz Colgate Kids Zero brand. Corra says the firm has started up this technology in five of its manufacturing plants and continues to adapt its manufacturing and supply chains so that by 2025 it can achieve its goal that all of its toothpaste will be in the recyclable tube.

Meanwhile, in Topeka Also busy working on a monolayer recyclable package are the packaging developers at Colgate subsidiary Hill’s Pet Nutrition in Topeka, Kans. In the most recent edition of the Flexible Packaging Association’s annual competition, the bottom-gusseted standup pouch they designed for 8-oz Hill’s Pet Nutrition pet food treats won a Gold Award for

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Packaging Excellence plus a Silver Award for Sustainability and another Silver for Technical Innovation. As we saw with toothpaste tubes, flexible packages for pet treats are also multilayer structures that include such things as aluminum, polyester, or nylon. But while these materials are terrific at delivering performance characteristics like toughness, barrier, machineability, and economics, they make recycling challenging because they consist of too many incompatible materials. By contrast, the material from which the Hill’s pouch is made, Thrive-Recyclable from Plastic Packaging Technologies, is described by PPT as monomaterial PE. According to Dave Potter, VP Technical and Engineering at PPT, it’s a two-layer lamination, and the two substrates are married by way of a solvent-free adhesive on a Nordmeccanica laminator. The outside layer is a clear 1-mil high-density polyethylene supplied by Jindal Films. PPT reverse prints this substrate in eight colors on a W&H flexo press. The inner layer is a five-layer blown coextrusion of PE resins. Included in the coextrusion, which PPT purchases from Charter NEX, is EVOH for gas barrier purposes. Sealant layers are included, too. Also important in this coextrusion is the presence of a compatibilizer technology from Dow called RETAIN. Without this Dow component, EVOH is not compatible with the PE recycle stream. But with it, the two incompatible materials mix and distribute evenly. PPT had to bring in all new Totani pouch converting equipment for this material. The big challenge is heat management. In a more traditional structure, where a 48-ga polyester is the outer layer, the material has a much higher heat resistance. You drive the heat through that outer layer of polyester to activate the polyethylene sealant layers, which have a lower seal initiation temperature. Then, once the seal is made, the sealing jaws are still able to open without sticking to the outer layer of polyester. But with this new structure, the outer layer is polyethylene. That makes it tricky to deliver enough heat for the inner sealant layers to be activated without also melting the outer layer of polyethylene. So this wasn’t just a matter of materials development. It required modification of existing pouch-making equipment by adding

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cooling bars and so forth. It’s an entirely new film technology where materials, equipment, and process all had to come together. This intersection of new packaging materials and the converting and packaging machinery on which they must run is a place that Colgate’s Molinar knows all too well. He oversees global packaging for personal care and home care, where containers fly through high-speed packaging lines at 500-plus per minute. “Every single gram you take out of a container complicates the process window,” he observes. “Every time we want to modify the filling temperature of a liquid product so that we can cool faster and thus fill faster, it creates a strain on container stability. But opportunities lie in this tension between the limitations of equipment and the performance characteristics of emerging materials. Nowhere do you see that more than in the challenges we face with monomaterials. It’s an interesting challenge to say the least, and an important one, too, since in categories like home care and personal care we use a lot of pouches that are various combinations of polyester and polyethylene. That’s why we’re working so closely on this monomaterial challenge with all three of the packaging machinery OEMs that supply us with our form/fill/seal equipment.” Two other observations Molinar makes when it comes to packaging equipment touch on flexibility and digital printing. “Considering how ECommerce and the whole direct-to-consumer idea is growing, we must be able to accommodate more and more different packaging configurations,” says Molinar. “Quick-change ability for varied case counts, for example, will be essential. Also being explored is greater flexibility on

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lines where the bottle shape changes frequently, and our team of engineers is looking at ways to accomplish this through magnetics rather than making a mechanical change as has typically been done in the past. As for digital printing, of course it will play a more prominent role as the notion of one size fits all gets replaced by the growing demand for personalized and customized packaging.” Returning to the topic of emerging materials, the question of cost is of course a crucial consideration. When asked about the economics of the new monomaterial used for the Hill’s Pet Nutrition pouch, PPT’s Potter is reluctant to throw out a number because there are so many variables involved, including the size of the package, what barrier properties are needed, and how many pouches are ordered. But when pressed he says materials in the Thrive line will carry a premium of anywhere from 15 to 25% compared to the multilayer alternatives they are designed to replace. It remains to be seen how many brand owners will pay such an upcharge. But Potter likes his chances for two reasons. First, brand owners of all stripes are more serious than ever about setting sustainable-packaging goals and then meeting them; using this material could go a long way toward helping them accomplish their objectives. And second, recycle-ready solutions for flexible packaging offered to brand owners in the recent past have come with an upcharge more like 35 to 50%. That could make the premium they pay for Thrive materials seem downright manageable. One other notable package developed by the talented Topeka team is a corrugated SIOC designed for getting 35-lb bags of dried pet food

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through the E-Commerce channel. Director of E-Commerce Cummings describes its evolution. “Because Amazon only stocks certain sizes of corrugated boxes, for a period of time they were putting our 35-lb bags into a large box with considerable dunnage. So we designed our own corrugated box, which was considerably smaller and had very attractive graphics. But now we’ve evolved again to a corrugated box that features hand holes. It’s less ink and it’s slightly downgauged. But it’s the hand holes that have generated a ton of positive feedback, which only stands to reason. Getting 35 pounds off the front porch takes some effort. Was the beautifully decorated box more aesthetically pleasing? Sure. But the revised box still delivers big on branding, on trust, and, perhaps most important, on delivering functional consumer value.” Cummings says that Amazon was so impressed with the functionality of this package that it holds it up as a model of what other brand owners might consider doing. Go to pwgo.to/5807 for a video on this clever E-Commerce packaging concept.

mized that way. Now it’s clear we need to build in more flexibility.” And sustainable packaging? “The key is getting the right balance between delivering a great consumer experience and doing the right thing for the planet,” says Verduin. “We’ve set some tough goals for the year 2025, including making sure that all of our packaging is either recyclable, reusable, or compostable. But if you don’t set lofty goals, how can you ever deliver what’s really called for?” PW

Impact of the pandemic As for COVID-19, Corra notes that some of the course corrections required by the pandemic highlighted the resiliency of Colgate’s packaging supply chain. “As the virus hit we started discovering that we couldn’t get as many pumps as we needed, so we quickly qualified a different closure that was more of a flip-cap style to keep liquid hand soap in full production,” he points out. “And look what we did and how quickly we did it with the bar soap we donated for the World Health Organization’s #SafeHands Challenge.” For more on this initiative, see Lead Off column on page 7. Molinar says that one change brought about by the pandemic will remain a permanent fixture at Colgate: expanded use of remote connectivity. “At the height of the pandemic, we had to install in a facility in Brazil a new shrink sleeve labeler fabricated in the Netherlands,” he says. “So we relied heavily on teleconferencing and virtual reality goggles to get the factory acceptance test done. It was fantastic the amount of information we were able to exchange. We all agreed it was one of the best FATs we’d ever experienced. We’ll be sure to build on this in the future.” Also fixed in Colgate’s future are the challenges it will face in an era when E-Commerce will continue to grow briskly and consumers are increasingly vociferous in their demand for more sustainable packaging. “We have a million challenges, but I think those are the two big ones,” says Verduin. The E-Commerce challenge, she says, is all about packaging and production lines that are versatile enough to crank out product that is thoughtfully omnichannel. “Remember, our channel has been brick and mortar for many years, and our lines are opti-

GEN 3 Over 20 footprint options make the RoBox customizable for your palletizing needs

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Visit the link below each item for more info.

38 PW DEC2020

AUTOMATION TECHNOLOGY

Non-Contact Sensor SICK’s Speetec is a sensor solution for moving materials in a linear path and special processes. It is able to measure a wide range of web and continuous materials, as well as blanks with an accuracy of just 4 µm.

SICK pwgo.to/5794

IIoT-Enabled Network Blocks

AC Drives

Carlo Gavazzi’s IIoTenabled network blocks feature an embedded web interface and OPC UA for full remote access and control of the IO-Link master and connected devices.

AutomationDirect’s DURApulse GS20 Series AC drives are IP66/NEMA 4X rated for operation in harsh environments. Available from 1⁄4 to 30 hp in singlephase 120VAC input, single-phase/three-phase 230VAC input, and three-phase 460VAC and 575VAC input.

AutomationDirect pwgo.to/5737

Carlo Gavazzi pwgo.to/5739

MAXIMIZE VERTICAL PACKAGING MATERIAL MOVEMENT

PFlow’s M Series Mechanical Vertical Reciprocating Conveyor:

EtherCAT Terminals Beckhoff Automation introduces EL51xx EtherCAT terminals with built-in incremental signal analysis functionality.

Beckhoff Automtion pwgo.to/5788

Provides efficient movement to mezzanines, between floors or between conveyor levels Available in optional galvanized, epoxy or stainless finishes for use in wash-down environments Has 5,000-6,000 lb. lifting capacity, perfect for lifting pallets or large boxes Travels at 25+ FPM CONTACT US TODAY TO LEARN MORE!

H2W Technologies’ single-axis linear stepper motors are suitable for high-speed open-loop positioning applications. They can perform at speeds of up to 80 in/sec [2 m/sec] and strokes of up to 68 in [1.7 m].

H2W Technologies pwgo.to/5740

M SERIES PASSION FOR LIFTING OUR WORLD SAFELY

Stepper Motors

www.pflow.com | (414) 352-9000 Milwaukee, WI Employee-owned and proudly manufactured in the U.S.A.

Automation_Technology_1220.indd 38

11/17/20 1:50 PM

LIP2020_A

Each of the following market-leading companies* participating in Packaging World’s 2020 Leaders in Packaging Program are named sponsors of PW’s Future Leaders in Packaging scholarship. This year’s recipient is the University of Florida Packaging Engineering Program. We appreciate the support of all participants on behalf of packaging education.

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Craft Brewer Grows into Two-In-One Palletizer, Stretch Wrapper Automation often begets more automation. That was certainly the case with Pelican Brewing Co., whose fast filling operations soon necessitated end-of-line palletization. WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

Knowing when to automate

Balancing channels during pandemic

By Matt Reynolds, Editor Pelican Brewing Co. was born at the beach in Pacific City, Ore. in 1996, the brainchild of three enthusiastic young folks, Mary Jones, Jeff Schons, and Darron Welch, whose thirst for great beer overshadowed their understanding of what it would take to build a brewery. They did it anyway. Now 24 years older and wiser, Pelican Brewing Company is a craft beer industry leader with fans throughout the Northwest and the world. The brewery’s physical footprint now spans its original, laid back beachfront pub and brewery in Pacific City, a more upscale restaurant and brewery in Cannon Beach, Ore., and—where most of the magic happens—a high-production brewery plus tasting room in Tillamook, Ore.

Pelican’s reputation is built on extremely high quality above all other factors, and the company has the awards hardware to prove their devotion in this department. Packaging plays a key role in quality by way of dissolved oxygen (DO) pickup during the fill. The less DO pickup during the handshake between the bottle fill and capping, or between the can fill and seaming, the higher the quality and the longer the shelf life of the beer. That makes packaging much more than just a delivery device for Pelican. So when the company was planning and specifying equipment for its current production facility in 2016, quality-conscious filling was the first concern. But once the primary packaging automation was up and running, producing the ultra-low DO brews at a rate of 200 bottles/min, a second factor swam into view—end-of-line labor. With filling lines humming along, manual palletizing became a daunting, ergonomically unfriendly, tiresome task, and Pelican’s Marty Bills realized backbreaking labor wasn’t the best deployment of his operations team. With limited space, adding a palletizer and stretch wrapper may have been tough, but they had planned for the eventuality of automated palletizers. The resulting two packaging lines, one for bottles and a second for cans, thus have a dual focus: quality on the front of the line and efficient, small-footprint palletizing at the end of the line. Here’s how they did it.

The packaging lines

The rotary labeler affixes clear p-s labels, from rollstock, onto clear brown 12 oz. bottles. These clear labels put the beer first, even at the expense of billboard space.

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Pelican opened its new 15,000-sq-ft production facility in 2016, and immediately began planning packaging all new lines—little of the legacy equipment would make the move. But while the facility now features two complete, soup-to-nuts packaging lines, their installation was more of a graduated process. The bottling line installation was first to come together, integrated in 2016 in partnership with David Weller of Pacific Packaging Systems Inc. It consists of a Ska depalletizer at the front of the line that feeds empty glass bottles into a rotary labeler by P.E. Labelers (Pelican labels

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Packaging operations at Pelican include a full canning line and a full bottling line, each capped by its own combination stretch wrapper/ palletizer. empty instead of filled bottles). Bottles are filled on a 30-head rotary KHS filler and capper, then run through a Filtec fill-height detector. Bottles are laser coded with batches and dates on Domino coding and marking equipment. Secondary packaging for bottles consists of a Pearson box shop, which does the carrier and case erecting. Erected paperboard carriers are fed into a Hartness case packer that receives the filled and capped bottles, places them in the erected six-pack carriers, and places those into corrugated cases. The most common format is 12-oz. bottles in six-pack paperboard carriers, which are packed two-by-two into a 24-count corrugated case. A less common format is a 12-pack format of 22-oz bottles. Cases run through a Pearson top sealer before palletizing, which initially was done by hand. But automation frequently begets more automation downstream, and a rule of thumb in craft brew is that once you’re getting to speeds of about 200 containers/min, that’s the point when end-of-line automation starts making sense. And 200 bottles/man was the cruising speed for the upstream filler and case packing equipment. “When we first started up that line, our volume was low enough where we only needed one operator hand palletizing, but we grew so

Jumpstart on demand Learn more about packaging line automation, along with a host of other on-trend packaging topics presented during the recent PACK EXPO Connects Jumpstart sessions, at packexpoconnects.com.

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quickly that we needed a second operator before long,” says Marty Bills, Director of Brewing Operations at Pelican. “I think by January 2018, we were just beginning to realize that we were stacking more than 3,000 cases per day. We could get by doing that with two guys in January, but by the heat of the summer, that would become really grueling and even damaging on operators’ bodies.”

End-of-line automation Even in a 15,000-sq-ft facility, it’s not always easy to be adding large pieces of equipment to existing lines. Luckily, Weller and Bills had designed the line with the eventuality of a palletizer in mind. In fact, they had one specified that would save them some space. They selected a TopTier model TTL 30 low-level infeed palletizer with concurrent stretch wrapping capability for the bottling line, eliminating the need for a separate traditional, pedestal-style stretch film wrapper. Where there would otherwise be two standalone systems, the TopTier does it in one, saving both cost and footprint. A pallet dispenser and some exit conveyance are also onboard on the TTL 30, and all of the palletizing, stretch wrapping, and pallet handling is fully automatic. An operator can use a single HMI to adjust the pallet pattern and the pre-stretch film’s load containment tension. “The TopTier palletizers have been great,” Bills says. “They allow us fast and careful handling, and they’re directly adjacent to our docks. We don’t store much inventory here on-site—we have 30,000 sq ft of storage south of town for that. That’s where our bottles and cans reside, as well as materials like corrugated and carriers, plus we have cold storage. So here we load direct-to-trailer and ship it four miles down the street. They warehouse it and ship to our distributors from there.”

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The palletizers are capable of handling line speeds of upwards of 400 cans per minute, or 1.5 to 1.75 layers per minute in palletizing parlance, so Pelican has room to grow into them or speed up if need be.

Move into cans Pelican’s bottling line was fully dialed in—from depalletizers to end-of-line automation—by mid-2018. But that time frame coincided with consumer demand veering toward craft beer in cans instead of bottles. Counterintuitively, this actually worked in Pelican’s favor—other breweries were moving into cans so quickly that a void for bottles was created. Pelican happily filled that void. Getting shelf placements at retailers was comparatively easy in bottles, and the brewery was able to grow its bottle profile while everyone else was shifting to cans. “We thought, ‘Wow, that makes us look pretty smart,’ and even though we knew it was mostly an accident, we were willing to take it,” Bills says. “But we also knew the writing was on the wall that we’d have to start offering cans.” Plus, the recent can trend in craft beer isn’t just a fleeting consumer fad to be weathered. Retailers prefer cans because they can put more SKUs on the same shelf space, a factor that trickles down to distributors who sell into retail. As a brewery, Pelican listens closely to its distributor partners, and all signs were pointing to cans. Pelican first experimented with mobile canning but Bills never felt fully comfortable with them due to inability to closely control DO. After all, that translates directly to the brewery’s hallmark quality. So, Bills again contacted Wells at Pacific Packaging Systems in 2019, and the two began drawing up plans for a canning line that would fit. This time, though, they didn’t wait on end-of-line automation. Expecting to be immediately running close to capacity, a TopTier palletizer—the same model in fact—was on the end of the new packaging line when they first fired it up. “Why would we put in a fast, new line, only to hand stack?” Bills asks, having learned from the first bottling line installation.

Automation No Enemy to Labor As is often the case when new automation is introduced, operators were nervous about the prospect of a machine replacing their manual case-stacking labor. In fact, one of the operators outright asked Bills how many people would lose their jobs due to the palletizer. “I told him, ‘Nobody’s going to lose their job,’” Bills says. “I had to explain that we were going to retrain them and teach them to learn different skills that will be even more valuable to both him and us. No matter the industry— packaging or brewing—people come and go, and quality people are hard to find and retain.” About six months after the palletizer was installed, the same young man confessed that he hadn’t believe Bills’ earlier reassurance. But since, he had realized that not only did he still have a job, but that his position was growing. And even with the palletizer there, it’s not a fully automated, lights-out operation. There’s still plenty for operators to do on the line to keep things running efficiently, just not necessarily lifting and stacking 3,000 cases per day. “For somebody who’s 20-something, that feeling of being valued and being trained is a big deal,” Bills says. PW

Leap to rotary filller

Most brewers new to canning tend to start with smaller, slower inline fillers maxing out around 40 cans/min, learning to crawl before they learn to walk. But with fill-quality the most important factor at the front of the line, and oxidized beer being Pelican’s mortal enemy, Bills had a sense that a rotary filler could do a better job with DO than in-line fillers. This led Pelican to jump into the deeper end with canning, choosing a CFT rotary filler with an electrostatic can rinser on the infeed. The filler is capable of speeds up to 300 cans/min and features an automated clean-in-place (CIP) set up. Just upstream of this filler sits a Codi upper level depalletizer, plus conveyance by Bevco. “This filler’s DO levels were fantastic out of the gate,” Bills says. “What I really appreciated about CFT is they came here with a new valve design, but the integrating technicians decided they didn’t like it. So CFT came out and did another round of valve retrofit, and we never saw any cost. They put us down for half a day for the whole retrofit. Those refitted valves have been super stable, it’s a great valve design. We’re spinning a lot of cans out there now.” Downstream of the filler, cans are batch and date coded on the bottom with another Domino coding and marking system, thermal inkjet this time. The highest volume format on this line is the Cases run through a Pearson top sealer before palletizing, which initially was done by typical 12-oz printed can. These are cartoned into hand before the first TopTier palletizer was introduced. six-packs by a Switchback can-wrap cartoner. Four

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adapting fast, and the canning and bottling lines are cranking. In fact, Pelican moved to seven day per week brewing in February 2020, just before the COVID-19 outbreak, and they haven’t had to tap the breaks yet. “I think we all thought that when we put in a 15,000 square foot facility, that that would last us 20 years.” Bills says. “And here we are a few years down the road and we’re thinking of yet another facility.” Pelican owns some property nearby, and its owners are already thinking if that could possibly serve as a space for new-product development. Or maybe that could be converted to ready-toThe ability to palletize and shrink-wrap in a single footprint and enclosure was a major load cold storage, reducing some shipping and differentiator for TopTier in this project. For a brief video showing the two-in-one improving some logistics. Pelican leadership is palletizer and stretch wrapper in action, visit pwgo.to/5809. just starting to look at these options, and probably would have been much deeper into it if COVID-19 hadn’t happened. six pack cartons at a time are then tray packed, also on Switchback tray Another iron in the fire at Pelican is a rotary keg filler, and Bills has packing equipment, in corrugated 24-count trays, which are then pala specific KHS model in mind. When the foodservice business rebounds, letized on the new TopTier. and with it, draft beer in kegs, that might be a next piece to the puzzle. A newer, more experimental format is a 19.2 oz tall boy-style, a conThe facility’s existing lines and venience store single-serve option. These are placed in power systems are already delightly branded 12-pack cases that are palletized directsigned to accept it. ly, with the expectation that cases will be broken down for c-stores and sold as singles. “The 19.2s are really popular right now, and we pack four of our leading brands in that,” Bills says. “That business is growing, but I think that our marketplace is still trying to decide what that right package size is.” The line is configured to also handle 16-oz cans, and Bills says Pelican might be testing that can format in the coming year.

Customer service a factor Aftermarket service and support is critical for most capital equipment investments, and these palletizers are no exception. And this type of equipment relies on some components that are subject to damage or wear. “When the photo eyes are damaged, that’s something we’ve asked for [TopTier’s] help on,” Bills says. “Service and support are readily available over the phone or in person. If the sensor gets damaged and we don’t know what’s going on, they’re very helpful. And when we get in over our heads, they’re not very far away [TopTier is located in Portland]. I think it’s only happened once where, as one of the systems was putting the first layer on the pallet, we kept crunching cases. It had something to do with the first slide-off. They came right out to the brewery and solved the problem. They knew the problem—they knew just how to adjust everything and got us back in alignment and basically worked with us throughout the morning to make sure that it was doing everything else we needed to do. It was really slick.”

What’s next The beer landscape—especially draft/keg—is in limbo due to the pandemic, with restaurants not doing the business that they previously were, and tap houses being more closely restricted. But Pelican is

PelicanBrewing.indd 43

Erected paperboard carriers are fed into a Hartness case packer that receives the filled and capped bottles, places them in the erected six-pack carriers, and places those into corrugated cases. “I think we’re in a great place, we are where we want to be,” Bills concludes. “We’ve got great new products coming out in January and February of this year that our customers are really excited about. The other project we have going is I’m just finishing integration [late October 2020] on a 100-barrel brewing system. We were turning our 30-barrel, six turns a day, seven days a week. Before COVID hit, we had already started on this new brewing system to supply beer. Once this is complete and fully product-tested, we’ll be balanced with our two packaging lines and our keg line for the foreseeable future.” PW

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44 PW DEC2020

Olé Mexican Foods Makes a Splash on “Sea of White” Shelf The brand broke new ground in a category that lacked shelf flair by enlisting clever printing on the customer-facing circumference of its puck-shaped thermoformed SVPs. WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

Distortion printing Mexican food accounts for more than 60% of the ethnic food market and is highly competitive. One of the most popular Mexican items is queso fresco, a crumbly white cheese that presents a unique challenge for brands that want to differentiate themselves. That’s because it’s typically sold in round, puck-shaped horizontal thermoformed vacuum skin packs, made of a polyolefin-based film, with brand information printed only on the top and bottom. They tend to be stacked on top of each other in any retail dairy case, limiting shoppers to a side view and resulting in a “sea of white” outwardly unbranded packages.

Olé Mexican Foods recently went about reclaiming the lost branding space that rings the circumference of the queso fresco pucks. The company had previously tried to use various packaging options, including inserts and post-package adhesive labels, but were not satisfied with the results. It was determined that printing on the profile of the thermoformed package was the answer. But when Olé’s legacy supplier wasn’t able to accommodate, Sealed Air came forward as up to the challenge. Printing on plastic destined for thermoforming must occur prior to forming, so the graphic design must account for the distortion caused by molding process. The path to getting it right can be tedious, time-consuming, and expensive, but a tight collaboration between Sealed Air and the Moreno family, the owners of Olé Foods, allowed project trials to flow smoothly, and resulted in

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Horizontal form/fill/seal proper sizing and placement of the artwork on the profile of the queso fresco packaging. The resulting solution balanced cost and performance in adding clear, readable graphics on a thermoformed profile. How’d they do it? Sealed Air’s SEE Graphic Services combined its knowledge of distortion printing with expertise on horizontal form/fill/ seal equipment to design graphics that would be clear and legible after the thermoforming process. This also uses a proprietary ink system for surface printed inks that Sealed Air says have excellent abuse resistance. Olé provided Sealed Air with the details of its equipment, including the tooling drawing. This allowed Sealed Air to create graphics in registered print that would run repeatable package designs on that equipment. The customer equipment needed to be able to register the thermoformed bottom web, which it was able to do. Printing is done flexographically, and can use as many as to 10 colors. Sealed Air’s CRYOVAC works with all major equipment manufactures and can implement this technology on the vast majority of hf/f/s equipment that can register both top and bottom webs. When the project was finished, Olé Foods’ queso fresco became the first Hispanic cheese product in the dairy case to let consumers see the brand without having to pick it up. On top of a visually pleasing package with graphics that are easy to read at a distance, Olé’s product has immediate brand recognition that no other cheese brand has, according to the company.. Olé has applied the new packaging to two different brands and a total of eight SKUs, resulting in a 16% (1.5 MM) increase in sales over an eight-month period. “We couldn’t be more pleased with the visibility and recognition the new packaging has given us in the marketplace,” says Blake Johnson, Vice President at Olé Foods. “Our product now has the differentiation that none of our competitors has. If you take a photo of the Hispanic cheese section, you’ll see a sea of white, with our product being the only one that stands out.” —Matt Reynolds

11/17/20 3:58 PM

By Anne Marie Mohan, Editor, Shelf Impact!

New CDB Packaging Simplifies Product Story Aiming to become the “Nike of Wellness,” CBD brand beam was launched in 2018 to fill the gap that then existed between CBD products that were very medicinal and those that infused CBD into candy. The direct-to-consumer company was founded by Matt Lombardi and Kevin Moran after they trained for the Boston Marathon together. Says Lombardi, “The brand was built with the mission of being a better CBD brand consisting of products made from organic hemp with zero additives. We were searching for remedies to aid in recovery, sleep, and mental health and had a difficult time finding products that met our personal wellness standards. We then banded together to create better CBD products that are effective, natural, and non-toxic.” Beam’s first fans included A-list athletes such as race car driver Danica Patrick and professional golfer Billy Horschel. But with the pandemic came a huge surge in interest from a range of consumers. “Since the onset of COVID-19, beam has seen a 100% increase in sales as many consumers were experiencing anxiety, stress, and losing sleep, which beam specifically makes products for,” Moran shares. “We launched our focus capsules in September, and they sold out in less than 24 hours as this has been a time where concentration has been put to the ultimate test.” With the growth in popularity of its products, beam undertook a rebrand with brand-building agency Smith&Saint. This included dividing the beam product line into four categories, redesigning its website for a more convenient and navigable D2C experience, and designing new packaging graphics and colorways, with an eye toward future expansion into retail. Beam offers eight products plus a sample pack in capsule, topical, oil, and powder forms. They are packed in jars, sachets, pouches, or dropper bottles, depending on the product. With the rebranding, beam’s SKUs now fall into one of four categories, or the “beam 4”: recovery, sleep, balance, and focus. With the previous packaging, the coloring was focused primarily on beam’s signature blue color and used solid blocks of color. With the redesign, each category has its own color with a calming gradient

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across the package. Recovery is yellow, sleep is purple, balance is blue, and focus is green. “Friendly, approachable, and clear: These three adjectives are what drove this rebrand with the colors, the icons, and the copy,” says Lombardi. “The refreshed color palette was to be vibrant, reflecting the new energy we’re introducing (and re-introducing) with our product lineup. The icons are simple and tell the ingredient story without overcomplicating what’s already complicated. And the voice of our copy aims to be like a friend walking you through something new, eliminating the noise. It was all about being a breath of fresh air, making something perceived to be complicated quite simple.” Adds Moran, “Our packaging reflects the unique passion from a unique group of people who know who beam is. beam products will differentiate themselves from competitors on the shelf because of that solid identity. We feel that when you know what you’re about, and you know what your audience is about, it helps you speak the same language. In this case, that comes as a visual language that appeals to those who are eager to cut through the noise and get straight to the point around CBD. This philosophy led to colorful, digestible package design that simplifies and de-complicates information but yet is full of energy and movement that’s uncommon in the space. When it feels good to look at a product, it feels good to try it.” Beam products are sold online on its website for prices ranging from $29 for “the fixer” five-day sample pack to $95 for a 60-capsule jar of dream capsules. “We believe that consumers are mostly looking for quality, safety, and effectiveness when it comes to CBD and would prefer to spend a little more money on products that meet that criteria versus spending less on products that aren’t natural,” says Lombardi. The new packaging was introduced in September 2020 and was designed, along with the beam site, to adhere to big box retailer preferences, as the company is looking to eventually be sold at mass retailers like Target. Shares Moran, since the redesign, “customers have shared that they love the new look and feel it’s brighter and more refreshed.” —Anne Marie Mohan

11/18/20 6:03 AM

Visit the link below each item for more info.

46 PW DEC2020

TECHNOLOGY

Combination Inspection System

Recyclable Pet Food Packaging

Mettler Toledo’s compact CV3770 inspection system combines vision label inspection and checkweighing in one unit that accepts large package sizes, big inspection areas, and multiple inspections.

Printpack introduces the Preserve line of recyclable pet food packaging featuring Preserve PE, Preserve PCR, and Preserve Renewable.

Mettler Toledo pwgo.to/5635

Ink-jet Printer with UV Curing

Printpack pwgo.to/5800

Squid Ink’sCoPilot Max ink-jet printing system now offers UV curing capability for non-porous applications. System has a print height up to 2.8 in. per print head and the ability to run up to two print heads from one controller.

Squid Ink pwgo.to/5797

Fire Suppressant Shipping Wrap Pact’s recyclable wrap system exceeds proposed SAE G27 lithium battery packaging performance standards for air, land, and sea.

Pact LLC pwgo.to/5773

Hot-Melt Packaging Tape Shurtape introduces HP 535 heavy-duty hot-melt packaging tape specifically designed for sealing recycled corrugated cartons, including 100% recycled corrugated.

Continuous Motion Rotary Pouch Machines IMA Dairy & Food USA introduces the Ermetika Series of high-speed, continuous motion rotary machines for assembling, filling, and sealing spouted pouches at speeds from 120 to 480 pouches/min.

IMA Dairy & Food USA pwgo.to/5796

Shurtape pwgo.to/5768

Vf/f/s Bagger Robotic Carton Clamp Tool Piab’s EOAT robotic carton clamp tool for palletizing applications can handle boxes, crates, and trays and has a payload of up to 50 kg/110 lb (with lift assist).

Piab pwgo.to/5799

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Triangle launches the Model XYTLF vf/f/s liquid bagger designed for foodservice and other applications, including hot-fill and pumpable products. It is available in speeds to 30 gal/min.

Triangle pwgo.to/5798

11/18/20 6:02 AM

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Nuspark, Inc. www.nuspark.com

Packaging World www.packworld.com

Pflow Industries www.pflow.com

PMMI, The Association for Packaging and Processing Technologies www.pmmi.org

21, 49

Schneider Packaging www.schneiderpackaging.com

Serac Inc. www.serac-inc.com

Squid Ink Manufacturing www.squidink.com

Targeted Cover

Tetra Pak, Inc. www.tetrapakusa.com

Tri-Tronics Company www.ttco.com

Triangle Package. Machinery Company www.trianglepackage.com

Van der Graaf www.vandergraaf.com

24a

WestRock.com www.westrock.com

OFC

Connect with a Leaders in Packaging supplier and support packaging education!

www.packworld.com/leaders

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48 PW DEC2020

THE INSIDER

By Ben Miyares, Packaging Sherpa

Bacardí Scales Biodegradable Bottle Bacardí Ltd.’s approach to reducing marine plastic pollution is somewhat counterintuitive. They are adding 3,000 tons of plastic to their packaging mix. That’s not what the Ocean Conservancy is advising. “The inaccessibility of the majority of marine plastic pollution,” says the organization, implies that “there is currently little prospect for costeffective cleanup, suggesting that researchers and policymakers alike should primarily focus their attention on reducing future flows of plastic into the ocean.” Most marine plastic pollution (MPP) mitigation initiatives in the packaging field concentrate on stemming the flow of plastics into the sea by reducing the amount of plastics in their products, and boosting the use of recycled content. Bacardí’s approach is different. And more ambitious. In the next 18 months the company plans to replace 80-million plastic bottles–approximately 3,000 tons of plastic–with contact clear biodegradable, plant-based polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) containers for its entire spirits portfolio, including Bombay Sapphire gin, Grey Goose vodka, Patrón tequila, Martini vermouth, and Dewar’s scotch whisky. Bacardí rum will be first to convert to PHA bottles. The spirits giant worked on the project with Danimer Scientific, developer and manufacturer of Nodax PHA, which is derived from canola, palm and soy seeds. Danimer says the PHA bottles will biodegrade in a wide range of environments, including compost, soil, freshwater, and sea water, and after 18 months, “disappear without leaving behind harmful microplastics.” Bacardí intends to share its PHA bottle technology with other spirits makers, a strategy that could lower the cost of Nodax by increasing its production volume. The Bacardí/Danimer announcement comes as global concerns are rising about nearly 16 million tons of non-biodegradable microplastics embedded in the sea floor. These are fragments measuring between 5 mm and 1 μm, and make up more than twice the amount found on the surface of the ocean, according to a recent study by Australia’s national science agency—Commonwealth Scientific & Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO). It is believed that this is the first ever global estimate of the amount of microplastics on the ocean’s bottom. Bacardí is also developing a “sustainably sourced paper bottle.”

By integrating the Nodax PHA polymer, Bacardí says this alternative solution will have equally strong environmental credentials while ensuring the quality and taste of the spirit inside a bottle made of paper is as exceptional as one made of glass. As with other investigations of microplastics in marine environments, the CSIRO research’s primary interest was determining the volume of materials present rather than their origins. Few studies have conclusively identified how microplastics travel to the bottom of the ocean. Or where, specifically, they come from. “Larger pieces of plastic that get broken down to smaller pieces can sink to the seafloor, and ocean currents and the communities’ natural movement of sediment along continental shelves can transport them widely,” notes CSIRO. Scientists in the U.S. have shown microbial communities, such as bacteria, can inhabit this marine “plastisphere.” The microbes can weigh the plastic down, so it no longer floats. Mussels and other invertebrates may colonize floating plastics, adding weight to make them sink. “Cigarette butts, plastic fragments, bottlecaps, and food wrappers are common on land, though rare on the seabed,” says Denise Hardesty, principal research scientist and co-author of the CSIRO study. Meanwhile, it found entangling items such fishing line, ropes, and plastic bags are common on the sea floor. “The deep ocean is a sink for microplastics,” she says. Plastics found in the sea fall into two basic categories: macroplastics (large pieces including what most of us would recognize as “packaging,” i.e., bottles, caps, and flexible wraps, and microplastics: bits of plastics that are 5 mm or smaller. Microplastics are further divided into primary and secondary microplastics. Primary microplastics include microfibers from clothing, microbeads, and plastic pellets, also known as nurdles. Secondary microplastics, where most plastic packaging is categorized, are created when larger plastic pieces are degraded by natural weathering processes and include water and drink bottles, fishing nets, and plastic bags. Bacardí’s plan to replace Its petrochemical plastic bottles with biodegradable PHA bottles is intended to reduce the volume of secondary microplastics contributing to MPP. While not all of their PHA bottles will end up in the sea, one risk that will have to be monitored is the tendency of Bacardí’s customers to dispose carelessly of the biodegradable bottles. PW

Ben Miyares, Packaging Sherpa, is a packaging market and technology analyst and is president of The Packaging Management Institute, Inc. He can be reached at bmiyares@packmgmt.org.

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