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Retail-ready asparagus

The Gourmet Trading Company, a leading grower, packer, and distributor of asparagus and blueberries, contacted the Packaging Program at Cal Poly State University for help in designing a retail-ready shipper holding 11 lb of fresh asparagus.

Pw 2249 5 K Display Standard Clsd Wtag R

Among the requirements:

β€’ a two-piece format was needed so that in-store personnel could easily remove the top and turn the shipper into a consumer-friendly display tray
β€’ the display tray had to hold bunches of asparagus vertically to enhance display appeal and to keep the butt ends in contact with a water-saturated pad
β€’ the display tray had to sit on store shelves that had a two-inch lip and that inclined at a 60-degree angle
β€’ the shipper had to be made of corrugated polypropylene and had to accommodate manual set up and packing
β€’ the shippers had to be palletized 20 per tier in an eight-tier stack for shipment via truck, air, and ocean

All of these requirements were to be met without increasing the amount of PP used in an existing one-piece PP shipper that weighed 9.6 oz but lacked a retail-ready design. Also, adequate ventilation for hydro-cooling and fumigation of the asparagus had to be assured, and structural strength had to be as good as or better than the existing shipper.

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