Berry Global and Stora Enso have designed a custom version of Berry’s CombiLight pot for Finnish brand Valio’s PROfeel protein puddings, aiming to help the company meet its commitment to reduce plastic usage by 15% in its single-use single-serve packaging by 2026.
The CombiLight is a hybrid packaging solution made from a plastic skeleton and carton sleeve melted together to create a strong structure. Apparently, Valio had already switched its quark products to the CombiLight, but for the puddings the conversion required a new coating with enhanced barrier properties to ensure optimal shelf life.
Said to have a 120-day shelf life, the new packaging for the PROfeel puddings in flavours including chocolate, caramel, and vanilla-meringue, will launch this December. Valio says it plans to take on new markets with the pots while honouring a voluntary Green Deal, signed in 2023 with the Finnish government, to reduce plastic usage in packaging.
The pot design also seeks to reduce food waste and features improved print quality, including a printable bottom surface for mandatory product information.
“This change will also enhance consumer convenience, as consumers will no longer need to separate materials,” said Juhana Pilkama, head of packaging development at Valio. “For example, with the puddings, they can simply dispose of the entire packaging into carton recycling streams along with milk cartons.”
At the start of this year, Quaker Oats stated its plans to transition into paper packaging across its porridge pot range, aiming to streamline recyclability and remove a yearly estimate of up to 200 tonnes of plastic. The transition is hoped to benefit consumers by ensuring that the whole pack can enter the same recycling stream, simplifying its disposal.
More recently, UPM Specialty Papers and Unipaco teamed up to create a recyclable, heat sealable salad and herb pot wrapper, said to guarantee product safety and meet German 95/5 mono-material requirements, with single-component materials accounting for 95% of the packaging mass. The fibre-based wrapper is said to be safe for food contact and compliant with recyclability requirements.
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