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Del Monte adds food to aseptic PET beverage line

A blow/fill system originally installed for aseptic packaging of teas and juice-based beverages now is being used to bottle a specialty tomato sauce.

Each holding just under 18 oz of product, these aseptically filled PET bottles are available in colorful four-count paperboard c
Each holding just under 18 oz of product, these aseptically filled PET bottles are available in colorful four-count paperboard c

Del Monte Foods Sud Europa launched breakthrough aseptic packaging technology in late '96 when it began bottling beverages in an integrated blow-molding/filling system called ASIS (see Packaging World, November '96, p. 38 or packworld.com/go/ASIS). The innovative line consists of a SIPA (Vittorio, Veneto, Italy) linear blow-molding machine capable of producing 96 bottles/min and a Procomac (Parma, Italy) 50-valve aseptic rotary filler. In the U.S., SIPA is represented by SIPA North America (Atlanta, GA) and Procomac by Procomac North America (St. Petersburg, FL).

Although shelf-stable teas and juices in monolayer bottles of polyethylene terephthalate were the first commercial products to emerge from the ASIS line, Del Monte management had other products in mind almost from the day the system was installed. Last summer it tested one of them, Passata, in the Italian marketplace.

Loosely translated as "freshly squeezed," Passata is only produced during the 40-day period when fresh ripe tomatoes are harvested. Consumers use Passata as a base for sauces they serve over pasta.

Until last summer, Del Monte's Passata was exclusively hot-filled into glass jars. Use of that package, says Del Monte technical manager Mr. Sommi, will certainly continue.

"Our plastic container is positioned as an alternative to glass," says Sommi. "We don't want to cannibalize sales of Passata in glass containers."

Four-packs of the plastic bottles, each containing 500 g of sauce, sell at retail for the U.S. equivalent of $1.55. On a per gram basis, that's about the same as what consumers pay for 700 g of Del Monte's Passata in glass with a steel closure.

In 1998, Del Monte filled Passata in 1 million plastic bottles that were sold in supermarkets throughout Italy. Each bottle contained 55g (17.65 oz) of product. Although lacking a true barrier layer, the monolayer PET bottles were a relatively heavy 30 g, which helps explain why they were given a 11/2-year best-if-used-by date. The glass containers, by comparison, have a three-year shelf life.

According to Sommi, the decision to fix the shelf life at 11/2 years wasbased on accelerated shelf-life data. He adds that as far as taste is concerned, Del Monte's real-time experience with Passata in PET confirms the data from the accelerated test. But color, says Sommi, begins to darken slightly after 12 months. Ongoing research is aimed at addressing that issue.

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