Pack News of the week: compostable, protective and Cartoon Packaging

Compostable Packaging: The Reality on the Ground

This report reveals survey results from 40 facilities that accept food waste, which were identified to provide a range of size, composting method and geographic location of facilities. The survey was motivated by the packaging industry’s confusion as to how composting facilities treat foodservice packaging, because some facilities reject packaging, citing it as a contaminant to their composting process and finished product. Due to the growing number of individual facility, regional and state compostability standards, packaging designers and engineers have been unsure of how to approach compostable packaging.

Key findings include:

• 90% of facilities surveyed actively accept compostable packaging.
• 67.5% require compostable packaging to have some type of standard or certification before allowing it in the front gate.
• 82.5% want a more universally recognizable label of compostability.

Protective packaging market expected to rise to $22.2 billion by 2014

According to a new report by Bharatbook, "World Protective Packaging to 2014," world demand for protective packaging is projected to increase 7.8 percent per year to $22.2 billion in 2014. This represents a notable acceleration from the pace of the 2004-2009 period. Advances will be stimulated by an upswing in manufacturing activity and the continued proliferation of Internet shopping in both developed and developing regions.

These factors will necessitate heightened requirements for cost-effective packaging used in the protection of goods from shock, vibration, abrasion and other damaging effects of shipping and handling. Value gains will also be helped by the growing presence of environmentally friendly products -- such as those made from recycled or biodegradable materials -- which tend to be more costly than their conventional counterparts. However, such gains will stem from a low base. Also, the importance of price in the purchasing decisions of most packaging users will moderate demand for green products to some extent.

Kids Prefer Cartoon Packaging

Shrek, Dora the Explorer, and other animated TV and movie stars beloved by children have been moonlighting as junk-food pitchmen in recent years. And they're good at it.

In the study, which is published this week in the journal Pediatrics, Roberto and her colleagues presented 40 children ages 4 to 6 with paired samples of graham crackers, gummy fruit snacks, and baby carrots. Each pair of sample foods was identical down to the clear packaging, except that one of the packages had a sticker of Shrek, Dora the Explorer, or Scooby Doo on it.

Between 50 percent and 55 percent of the children said that the food with the sticker on it tasted better than the same food in the plain package. (The percentage varied with each food.) And between 73 percent and 85 percent selected the food in the character packaging as the one they'd prefer to eat as a snack.

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