Pouch packs providing innovative downturn alternatives - manufacturer
A spokesperson for Daytona Systems, which supplies automation systems to food and pharmaceutical groups, claimed the pouches are increasingly being seen to offer offering improved cost benefits from production through to distribution.
Citing its own figures, the group said that stand-up pouches were already the fastest growing packaging segment in the current global beverage market, with demand up by 18 to 20 per cent a year, amounting to $25.6bn (€19.6bn) in value during 2008.
Amidst criticisms of the use of bottles to store water products, and general wider-industry drives to cut down on pack waste, company spokesperson Klaus Liedtke said that pouches had been developed to better differentiate themselves on the market through specific benefits.
Although the pouches still rely on materials such aspolyethylene terephthalate (PET), already used in beverage pack applications like plastic bottles, new production technology related to capacity and filling had opened up the market to numerous applications.
Development
Daytona Systems says it has been able to produce filling equipment that can produce up to 500 750ml pouches with spouts per minute to 1,200 packs without spouts over the same time. The company added that pouches could also be used incold, hot, retort or aseptic fill.
“These speeds provide a solution that matches the rates high speed bottlers are able to fill products,” stated the group. “Up until now there was not a "cost-effective" machine on the market to replace rotary bottlers fillers.”
Liedtke claimed that on a logistic basis alone, pouches could allow some manufacturers to make major reduction to the cost and environmental impacts of their operations in relation to bottles.
“One truck of quart size pouches is equal to 9 truckloads of quart size bottles,” he said as just one of the potential examples of operational benefits.
Aside from reduced landfill space, additional environmental benefits were also linked to general use of its pouch designs, which Liedtke claimed were completely biodegradable.
Applications
Daytona Systems’ said that although development was ongoing for the packs, over seven years, the group said it had catered for a wide array of industry needs.
“You see today the usage of pouches in the pet food industry and different kinds of industrial use, like refill applications for soaps, shampoo, conditioners, motor oils or window cleaners,” statedLiedtke. “The equipment can accommodate all different kind of liquids and solid foods up to about half an inch in size. “
