Finding the Perfect Package for Your Food Business
The perfect package for your food business depends on the packaging requirements for your products and how you plan to present products to customers. A growing number of brands are selecting flexible packaging materials such as Mylar bags, as these materials are more compact, durable and lightweight than aluminum, glass or rigid plastic. Here are a few tips to help food businesses find the perfect packaging for products.
Making Your Package Unique
A packaging design and printing service can recommend the best approaches to unique packaging for snacks. It is important that snack packaging provides necessary information about a product including ingredients, nutrition and allergen information. Beyond these basic requirements, there are almost limitless possibilities for pursuing unique packaging designs.
Food packaging should protect and present contents. Stand-up packaging excels in both areas and also stands out when competitors use flat packaging or rollstock. Digital printing enables businesses to customize flexible packaging materials with high-resolution designs and photo-quality images. A combination of the style of packaging and the design printed on packaging can come together to present products in fresh and unique ways.
Package That Is Sustainable
Sustainable packaging can help any food brand keep up with the latest trends in packaging. It is important to note that sustainable packaging does not necessarily mean the same thing as recycled or recyclable packaging, though both of these types of packaging are sustainable. The sourcing and disposal methods for materials determine whether the packaging of a particular product falls into any or all of these categories.
Using recyclable materials such as polyethylene films to make custom stand up pouches can go a long way toward sustainability. Businesses can decide whether to mark these packages with generic #2 resin codes and store drop-off symbols or meet requirements for the How2Recycle program.
Packaging That Protects Contents
Well-designed packaging can present immediate appeal, but if customers open the package to find crumbled contents, they are less likely to be satisfied with a product and a brand. For this reason, It is important to strike a balance between good design and protective packaging. That is where the expertise of a packaging service that also does digital printing and ships roll stock in as little as five business days and finished pouches in just 15 business days.
Some food products may require the use of high-barrier films that seal out oxygen and water vapor to keep contents from degrading. Other packaging designs with fully formed bottoms and bottom or side gussets can protect contents while achieving a desirable shelf presence. A packaging specialist can recommend the right design for any consumable product.
Food businesses should select packaging materials that preserve the freshness of products. For many applications, high-barrier films are necessary to shield contents from exposure to air and moisture during distribution, sale and storage. Mono-material packaging is more readily recyclable, while multi-material packaging can prove more difficult to recover. Food businesses should work with a packaging materials and printing service to develop unique packages for products.