Brand owners in every category are looking for packaging ideas that save money and also provide marketing sizzle. At Pack Expo, Sonoco is revealing one tactic that is beginning to take root in powdered infant formula: high-performance composite cans, which are poised to take a place alongside traditional steel cans on shelf.
One early example of the new can is H.J. Heinz Co.’s relaunch of its Nurture Growing Baby Follow-on Milk in the U.K. Heinz replaced its metal cans with Sonoco’s new composite offering.
Srinivas Nomula, Sonoco market segment manager, says new grades of stronger, more rigid paperboard are making the new composite cans possible. Spiral-wound from recycled paperboard, Nomula says, the composite cans are safer to open and easier to reseal. They include a high-barrier liner that locks out moisture, oxygen, and odors, while also preserving product aroma and taste. In addition, the composite cans prevent product clumping—it’s a common complaint among shoppers in the baby food category—while protecting the nutritional integrity of the powdered product inside.
Sonoco says the composite cans offer economies in producing and shipping, but also rival the performance of metal cans in abuse resistance and shelf life.
Sustainability is a big area of interest among attendees walking the show floor, and Sonoco’s composite cans for powdered infant formula deliver results there, too. Nomula says that compared with metal cans, the composite-can alternative brings about a 27% reduction in material weight, a 34% reduction in energy use, a 20% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, and a 22% reduction in some regulated air emissions.
The composite cans average 50% recycled content by weight
