Food Packaging Trends: What Will 2018 Bring?
The rate of change in this industry has continuously sped up, and we have no reason to think it’ll slow down any time soon. What can you expect heading into 2018? Here are a few of our thoughts.
A Look Back at 2017
To anticipate where food packaging trends are going, it’s time to take a step back and see where it’s been. 2017 was probably most notable for automation. The recent economic recession is still fresh on our minds, and we’re still feeling the effects.
Food manufacturers acted out of necessity as they implemented automated packaging processes, but that necessity quickly morphed into opportunity. Manufacturers saw an edge in being more efficient, and here are just a few ways they did it in the last year.
- Packing and unpacking saw a significant shift toward robotics. This made the process faster and more consistent.
- Depalletizing was another area that benefited from automation.
- Tertiary packaging has also moved toward automation. As such, back-end processes have been made far more efficient.
Expect this trend to continue into 2018 and beyond.
What Will Be the Big Change in 2018?
As far as exciting new developments, we expect sustainability to become the hottest topic in the food packaging business. Because automation has freed time and resources, food manufacturers can turn their attention to consumer preferences. What consumers increasingly want to know is that their buying habits are making some sort of positive difference.
For food manufacturers, packaging is the low-hanging fruit. In other words, you can make a big impact with small changes. Here are a few tactics you’re likely to see employed in 2018.
- Recyclable materials will become more common, and they will be more heavily marketed as such.
- Back-end packaging will become lighter. It’s not as glamorous as the packaging the consumer sees, but it can make an enormous difference in terms of conserving energy and resources.
- Promoted causes are becoming more popular. Food packaging is an excellent place to advertise to consumers that a company is making positive change. We’re already seeing it with locally sourced products, etc. Expect to see packaging that shows what a company is doing to be more sustainable.
Of course, a year is a long time. Sustainable packaging is part of broader industry trends that will make us more efficient and better attuned to consumer needs.
PacMoore’s business model gives us the ability not only to adapt to change, but also to influence it, and not just in the realm of consumer packaging but also with our industrial options for extrusion, spray drying and dry blending. Contact us today to learn more about what we can do for you.
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