Optimising Flexible Packaging
- Date
- July 2007
- Documents
-
CS - food flexible film, july 2007
(1968 kb)
Report: Integrity Seal, July 2007
(10642 kb)
Report: Salad Bag Film May 2007
(379 kb)
Around 110,000 tonnes of flexible film are used in the UK every year across a wide variety of sectors ranging from salads to crisps, confectionery and bakery products. If all these sectors lightweighted their packaging by 25%, savings of 27,500 tonnes would be achieved resulting in carbon savings of 25,500 tonnes.
WRAP supported two projects in the salad market which, in combination, have the potential to generate packaging savings of around 25%. While these projects focused on salad, they are relevant to all product areas using flexible film.
Integrity SealTM (pictured right) trialled a new method of hermetically sealing film bags. It can generate packaging savings of at least 10%, and has the potential to increase shelf-life which could lead to reductions in the amount of food that is wasted.
The Integrity SealTM technology was trialled by Marks and Spencer. Trials were so successful that they have announced that they will be the first retailer to adopt the new technology, by introducing it across all their salad bags during Summer 2007.
The other trial looked at whether the gauge of film used for salad bags could be reduced in thickness from 35 to 30 micron without sacrificing product or pack quality.
Economics
The benefits
- Potential material savings of up to 25% with associated commercial benefits;
- Potential to save 27,500 tonnes of material if taken up across all sectors; and
- Integrity SealTM has the potential to increase shelf life which could reduce food waste.
