Brand-owners: How time-consuming, and how expensive is it for you to find your ‘dream’ co-packer? Your job just got easier. The new Co-Packer Connection has launched as a free industry resource, at www.copackerconnection.com.
Until now, the site has been spread by word of mouth as a database service administered by Scott Thomas, co-pack director of Sealed Air’s Shrink Packaging division, which includes Cryovac Films & Shanklin Machinery.
“I got the initial idea for this service back in the early ’90s,” Thomas says, after he noticed “all these CPGs spending lots of money, sending researchers all over the country to find co-packers and get them qualified. I thought, ‘What if the CPGs could access that same information via a database, and they could get that key information with just a few clicks?”
Now they can. At present, more than 530 co-packers have been identified with details that go far beyond an ID number and contact information to include: square footage, years in operation, financial data, ratings/certifications, MBE status; on-site maintenance; key technologies and systems, types of packaging machinery and much more.
When a manufacturer or CPG inquiry is received, Co-Packer Connection cross-references its secure, encrypted database, and responds to the inquiry with a short list of co-packers matching the desired criteria.
The service is administered by Sealed Air, which can also provide technical and sourcing assistance for film and machinery. And while the company’s four dozen North American field reps (some pictured) can to extend the capabilities of the service, there is no requirement to do business with the company; customers and non-customers alike receive “identical database service levels,” Thomas says.
He adds that the service has already saved brand-owners “significant investment in time and travel, and most importantly, in providing speed to market solutions.”
Contract Packaging invites readers to contact the editor with details of their experiences.
