Primary and secondary packaging are highly customizable, enabling contract packaging companies to devise and implement the best possible solution for each food product’s packaging requirements. When developing custom food packaging applications, packagers strive not only to preserve the freshness and quality of perishable goods, but also to deliver high safety standards, protecting food products from damage, pollution, tampering, and contamination.
Protecting food from external elements, intentional tampering, and physical damage are key responsibilities shared by food producers and contract packagers. Among the universal benefits of well-executed food packaging strategies, utilizing proper packaging increases the shelf-life of food products and ultimately safeguards consumers’ health and well-being.
The Best Food Packaging Preserves Freshness and Quality
Maintaining freshness and preserving food quality are primary objectives shared by producers, manufacturers, retailers, and food packagers. The most effective modern packaging solutions meet or exceed the freshness requirements of package contents, utilizing materials and package designs that work best for each food product. A few common considerations for food producers and their packaging partners, successful food packaging strategies preserve food quality by:
- Controlling moisture – Minimizing moisture loss and gain keeps products from drying out during distribution or becoming too moist, which can lead to lost crispness or off flavors.
- Reducing exposure to light – Light and heat promote bacteria, so packaging foodstuffs in dark enclosures can help keep contents fresh and safe.
- Limiting exposure to air – Contact with air speeds up food degradation, so the most effective packaging solutions help regulate the exchange of oxygen, nitrogen, and carbon dioxide reaching food products.
- Maintaining temperature – Specially designed packaging protects products from temperature extremes.
Food products are grown and manufactured globally, often requiring distant shipment before reaching end users. Throughout the handling process, food packaging may be exposed to pollution and contaminants. Well-designed food packaging incorporates barriers that reduce consumer risk and maintain food quality. Depending upon the items packaged, films and specialized packaging materials are introduced as barriers against air, moisture, and other harmful elements.
As well as devising food-safe packaging solutions, contract packagers also put packaging to the test, pressing their limits to ensure packages are constructed to hold up during distribution and merchandising.
Proper Packaging Provides Protection from Physical Damage
In addition to limiting exposure to air and other elements that threaten freshness and quality, food products also require protection from physical damage. Examples such as egg crates, puncture-resistant pouches, and cardboard cases all offer product-specific protection for the food and beverage industry. Properly deployed, these and other packaging protocols protect against breakage, contamination, and food loss.
Packaging innovation accounts for food safety and consumer preferences, but convenience and economic considerations also drive packaging decisions. Handling remains an important concern for packagers, resulting in tried-and-true methods that have been in service for decades. In one stalwart example drawn from a United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) publication, the food protection offered by cartons, crates, cans, and glass bottles also provides stacking strength for efficient handling.
Food Packaging Acts as an Identifier
On top of providing physical protection during distribution, packaging also enhances product integrity. Educated consumers are adept at checking freshness and food packaging sell-by dates, so it is no surprise shoppers also pay attention to the relationship between packaging and contents.
- Authenticity – Buyers rely on packaging to authenticate products. Information found on packages helps convince consumers they are buying from reputable brands. From logos and ingredient lists to company contact information, well-executed packaging offers assurance that package contents come from legitimate makers.
- Marketing – Distinctive packaging not only protects and preserves food products, but packages also reinforce branding. Comprehensive sales and marketing strategies incorporate effective packaging solutions that create strong brand associations and cannot be easily copied by competitors.
- Counterfeit Goods – Packaging helps expose counterfeit and fake food products. Phony foodstuffs impinge on the legitimate market, so packaging companies keep consumers safe by incorporating holograms, QR codes, and other anti-counterfeit measures.
Enhanced Food Safety Include Tamper-evident Packages
Value-added packaging keeps food products fresher longer, as well as providing barriers against accidental damage and environmental contamination. Unfortunately, products are also vulnerable to intentional tampering. Tamper-evident packaging is designed so that users can see if anything about the package has been changed, damaged, opened, or removed.
According to the FDA definition, a tamper-evident package or seal incorporates one or more indicators or barriers that if breached or missing, provide reasonable evidence that tampering has occurred. Further, the organization stipulates that the indicators or barriers should be distinctive by design, making the tamper-evident enclosures hard to duplicate, without access to packaging industry materials and processes. An important distinction is made between tamper-resistant packaging, designed to discourage tampering, and the tamper-evident packages described by the FDA, which actually offer visual confirmation that product integrity has been compromised.
Certain segments of the tamper-resistant packaging market were already on the rise prior to the pandemic, but demand for safe packaging solutions exploded in the shadow of the global health threat. In the fresh foods grocery aisle, grab-and-go products once accounted for much of the expansion in tamper-evident packaging, until COVID food trends sparked skyrocketing demand.
Responding in part to COVID-related consumer shifts toward third-party food delivery and curbside service, packagers streamlined the number of packaging touchpoints and developed methods for sanitary food delivery, including stickers, seals, and labels indicating tampering. In addition to promoting food safety, tamper-evident packaging also supports quality control, reduces accidental loss, and reinforces trust between producers and consumers.
In Conclusion
Packaging plays a central role preserving food freshness and protecting consumers from foodborne illness. In addition to providing physical fortification during distribution and marketing, effective food packages also incorporate barrier materials that protect food quality and keep out contaminants. Whether incorporating a secondary packaging layer for added product protection or utilizing tamper-evident wraps for shipments, experienced contract packagers understand that proper packaging promotes consumer safety and preserves food quality.
Assemblies Unlimited provides complete contract packaging services across a wide range of product types and industries. With extensive experience in consumer safety and food packaging services, we are positioned to support your packaging compliance needs from concept to completion.
