The bigger picture

Packaging development today is an extremely involved process says Ian Crawford, exhibition director for Total Processing & Packaging 2007

There can be few markets where the pace of new product development is as fast as it is in personal care. In a sector where image is everything and competition is intense, brands have to constantly reinvent themselves and find a new USP in order to maximise on-shelf presence, maintain existing consumer loyalty and attract new customers.

This presents an ongoing challenge for the packaging industry, with packs playing a central role in helping to establish, promote and protect brand image and encourage purchase.

As a result, high levels of new product development are matched by equally intense new pack introductions. As in other fashion conscious markets, the premium end is often under attack from more everyday products. As the latter adopt some of the premium sector's latest innovations and techniques, so the top brands seek to introduce new ideas and breakthroughs, which in turn will eventually filter down the chain. This helps to feed a continual development cycle.

For example, high impact decorative effects such as embossing and gold blocking are now far more common. Innovative closures and dispensing systems are today used as much for mass market bath foams and shampoos as for those in the premium sector. Not that these moves are all one-way. The continuing developments and enhancements to plastics, for example, have enabled the material to make significant inroads into the supply of jars for top brand creams and lotions, which was once the preserve of glass.

Such an intense pace of change has a significant effect on cost pressures, with the need to bring products to market in record time. This requires packaging manufacturers to have equally fast, focused new pack development procedures able to react to customer requirements and produce finished containers from initial concepts within extremely tight deadlines.

And of course cost pressures are not limited to the design and production of the pack itself. In the factory, the entire filling and packing process is coming under increasing scrutiny, with managers and engineers challenged with finding ways to increase throughput, improve efficiencies, have quicker start-ups, less downtime and improved maintenance.

The finished pack on-shelf is in fact the last line of a process that starts with the delivery of the raw materials to the factory. The nature of the product governs the materials used, the design of the pack, the choice of closure and the possible need for an effective measuring or dispensing system. Equally the design of the pack needs to take into account how the product is to be filled, the limitations of an existing production line or the requirements of a new one. If the pack is labelled or sleeved, does this take place as part of the filling and packing process? And legislative or retailer requirements may necessitate the incorporation of coding equipment onto the line.

Indeed few things in the modern manufacturing scene happen in isolation so it is hardly surprising that processing and packaging operations are inextricably linked and influence one another. Whether we think that the process defines the nature of the packaging or vice versa, the fact is that the two disciplines act and react with each other on a continuous basis. For example, crucial parameters such as temperature, viscosity and solids content might be specified either to improve the process, or simplify or improve the quality or efficiency of the packaging operation, or both.

A successful pack may be greater than the sum of its parts, but getting all the elements that contribute to this end result right is vital. What is becoming clear is that the boundaries between all these elements are continuing to blur. A poll conducted at the Total Processing and Packaging event in 2004 showed that as many as 35% of senior executives, a figure that corresponds to data from other exhibitions, were responsible for processing and packaging.

In essence, this means that the approach of most new product development processes has become much more focused on the whole project rather than the individual elements of processing and packaging.

The packaging and processing industry is therefore adapting to meet the needs of these new super buyers. Today it is not unusual to see pack or material manufacturers recommending particular pieces of filling or application equipment, or pack and machinery manufacturers working in close liaison to ensure process efficiencies are achieved throughout the production and packing operation.

Best in show

Exhibitions too are reflecting this development. The 2007 version of Total Processing and Packaging will encompass everything from raw materials, transport and storage right through each processing stage to the final package.

Unlike the first Total in 2004 where the packaging and processing elements were segregated, the 2007 show will acknowledge the interaction between the disciplines with a natural flow between the halls echoing the journey from raw material to finished, packaged product. The aim is to make the event the most focused industrial exhibition to be staged in the UK.

For the personal care sector, this will be an opportunity to place its glamorous, image enhancing finished packs in the context of how they actually reach the shelves - demonstrating the many stages involved in bringing a pack from concept to realisation and at the same time providing a more accurate reflection of the current state of the market.

Contact

James Coleman

Total Processing & Packaging, UK

Tel +44 20 8910 7769

Email james.coleman@reedexpo.co.uk