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'Healthy' carton energizes nutritional beverage

Multilayer, skived-edge gable-top carton for NuVim’s energy drinks virtually eliminates previous carton’s tendency to bulge.

Pw 16055 Nuvim1

About the last thing a beverage manufacturer wants is for its drink cartons to bulge outward on store shelves. And though that was only an occasional problem for NuVim, Inc., it was vexing enough to force a packaging change last year for the company’s 64-oz gable-top cartons of NuVim.

The Paramus, NJ-based maker of nutraceuticals introduced NuVim energy drink in June 2000, in gable-top cartons. The trouble was that the company began to notice that carton sides tended to bulge outward. This was “due to leeching of product into the raw edges of the board,” explains Paul Young, NuVim’s vice president of operations. “The wicking caused the board to become softer and lose some of its rigidity.”

Adds Richard Kundrat, chairman and chief executive officer: “The package looked like it was swelling, but actually the board structure was breaking down and causing the packaging to bow.”

Both NuVim representatives agree that the previous carton structure was unsatisfactory. “We had some complaints and product returns. It wasn’t so much the returns [that eventually prompted packaging changes], but the cartons just did not project the quality image we wanted,” Kundrat states.

It didn’t take long for the privately held firm to find a suitable carton replacement. The CEO sought out the services of International Paper (Memphis, TN), with whom he had worked at a previous job with Unilever.

Last year, NuVim began using IP’s Tru-Taste® Gold advanced juice carton. The 24-pt carton uses the supplier’s patented Barrier-Pak® technology that incorporates multiple high-performance polymers. The supplier would not reveal specific structural details.

“IP’s carton is a better and stronger package,” Kundrat says. “Every aspect of it is better, including its thickness, coating, and overall quality control.” More specifically, Young says IP provides a better skived carton. Skiving is a process done by IP during board converting in which the carton manufacturer folds inward, or under, the exposed or “raw edges” along the carton’s seam or fifth panel. That nearly eliminates the problem of wicking that can lead to carton bulging. He also says the Tru-Taste Gold carton provides better barrier properties than did the previous gable-top carton.

IP uses six-color litho printing to deliver an appealing front-panel decoration that illustrates product pouring into a glass surrounded by fruit. The product flavor is printed at the bottom of the image.

Filling is outsourced

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