Complex films simplify flexible packaging choices: recent innovations in films boost the material's performance and open up new applications in the food and medical markets

Food & Drug Packaging, April, 2004 by William Makely

As another medical packaging example, Sengewald Klinik-produkte is using a new film from Rollprint, called HDPE-AllegroT, to package its hospital drapes, gowns and other items. These products are typically packaged in paper-based packaging which can emit fibers into the operating theater environment when opened. HDPE-AllegroT is an all-polymer structure that is fiber-free.

On the food front, Carl Buddig & Co. is using a patent-pending multilayer coextruded nylon/ polyester film--called ICE[R] from Curwood--for its Carl Buddig Snack Buds lunchmeat packages. Clarity, formability and excellent printability combine to make the Buddig package attractive yet cost-effective to produce.

Here's another "meaty" development. Curwood went for strength in developing its unique ArmorX CBP (Complete Boneguard Protection) bag for wrapping larger bone-in cuts of meat, which a number of undisclosed meat processors are using. The bag is a continuous lamination of two proprietary coextrusions, and combines tough puncture resistance (throughout the bag rather than in strategic patches) with clarity, excellent shrink performance and two-side register printability for graphic impact.

New 'engineered' films

Film manufacturers continue to engineer new materials--antibacterial and biodegradable--that also boost performance.

Mitsubishi Pharma Corp.'s Carex Inc. subsidiary has developed an anti-bacterial film that it plans to begin marketing in North America in 2004. The active ingredient in the film is allyl mustard oil--already approved for use as a flavoring, and recently approved by the Food and Drug Administration for packaging use.

The substance, combined with adhesive for stability in the film, will be introduced into films used to package bread, vegetables and prepared foods, and reportedly can retard spoilage for up to one year.

The flexible packaging industry continues its work on biodegradable materials:

* Metabolix Inc. is working with the U.S. Army's Natick Soldier Center to develop biodegradable film. The partners will work to develop commercially acceptable film packaging using polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA), bio plastics with varying properties ranging from rigidity to flexibility. Although PHA can also be used for rigid packaging, in this application, the films will combine barrier properties and biodegradability that will help the military eliminate the waste generated by the half-billion single-use packages it uses each year.

* And Cargill Dow LLC has developed a corn-based plastic packaging film that organic foods retailer Wild Oats National Marketplace uses to package deli items. When composted after use, the film degrades into water, carbon dioxide and organic material.

Continuing growth

Nanocomposite additives, biodegradable resins, anti-bacterial film sealant layers, nine layer laminations and laminations of coextrusions--these are innovations that are changing not just the way film-based packaging performs, but how it is converted, how much it costs and what new market segments it can enter.