Cermex Develops Eco-Friendly Shrink-Wrap Packaging

Honeycombed packs offer great opportunities in terms of design and promotional marketing thanks to the multitude of pack shapes possible.

3 May 2012 --- Cermex has recently developed a new solution for collating products on its shrink-wrappers in order to create honeycombed packs. These staggered bottle configurations offer many advantages for both bottlers and their customers in terms of packaging stability, originality and automation as well as the accrued economic and ecological benefits. Here are the main advantages of this innovative packaging and the solutions for its automation.

- Original pack concept and multiple configurations

Honeycombed packs offer great opportunities in terms of design and promotional marketing thanks to the multitude of pack shapes possible. The originality of more attractive pack displays on supermarket shelves contributes to boosting sales.

- Improved pack stability and rigidity

Honeycombed packs can be adapted to all types of cylindrical products from 0.25 to 1.5L where large product collations are required (such as water, soft drinks and juices or certain food products). By using a configuration of alternate bottle rows, consequently creating more points of contact, the honeycombed pack is more stable and rigid.

- Elimination of corrugated support

The resulting pack rigidity makes it possible to purely and simply do away with any corrugated support (tray, u-board or pad) originally required for traditional packs. This gives rise to numerous advantages such as:

* A significant financial saving in packaging costs: between 5 and 6 euros cents per pack (depending on the cost and dimensions of the corrugated support previously used), i.e. an annual saving which could reach several hundred thousand euros depending on the products, speed and production data.

* A reduction in machine investment cost: saving in the non-purchase of a corrugated support module.

* Pallet optimization and consolidation: up to 20% more bottles per layer depending on the patterns, consequently reducing the cost of pallet storage.

* Greater safety in manipulation in the distribution chains: no risk of pack deterioration during manual or automated handling, thanks to improved solidity

* A cost-efficient, sustainable, eco-packaging

Thanks to the reduction in secondary packaging, honeycombed packs are not only economical but easy to recycle given that only one material is used (film). Honeycombed packs consequently make a significant contribution to protecting the environment and reducing waste. The reduction in carbon footprint is proportional to the reduction in packaging waste.