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How Wrigley and others prevent package recalls

Did you know that a pack of Orbit gum has at least 13 distinct components? Here's how Wrigley and others address recall risks from chemical migration, off-odors and other hard-to-spot factors.

Recalls of food or consumer packaged goods (CPG), even if they don't directly threaten the health of consumers, can still damage brand image, customer relationships, sales, shelf space and revenues. Yet many risks can be very hard to spot if you're not looking specifically for them in their hiding places in handling materials, product, packages and cartons across the supply chain. 
 
In addition to  allergens, mislabeling and mixed-labeling issues—see related story "How to prevent food labeling mixups"—mold, chemical migration and off-odors/tastes figured prominently in a panel discussion on a broad set of recall risks.
 
Rob Osborn, senior packaging compliance scientist with Wm. Wrigley Jr. Co., cited a recall of roughly 28 million boxes of Kellogg's cereal based on reports of off-odors. "Sales were down for several weeks [and] affected the entire cereal industry," he said.
 
Sometimes the cure can seem as bad as the problem: Facing complaints of a musty smell on pain relievers, both Johnson and Johnson and Pfizer in 2010 investigated and ultimately blamed a chemical treatment applied to wooden pallets intended to prevent mold. 
 
Chemical migration
Such incidents have driven Wrigley, to do more exhaustive work to prevent a broader set of packaging related risks. Did you know there are at least 13 distinct components in a pack of Wrigley's Orbit gum? These fall in four categories:
  • Envelope: Over lacquer, printing inks, paperboard, adhesive
  • Bellyband: Aluminum foil, laminating adhesive, paper
  • Gum wrapper: printing inks, paper, wax coating
  • Overwrap: Plastic film, printing inks, tear tape
The complexity of packaging even a simple product lead Osborn and others to present the analytical testing, regulations and standards that can prevent chemical migration from the package from adversely affecting the product. 
 
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