OPINION
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Inside Ernest Shackleton’s 1907 hut in the Antarctic
are shelves of the original tinned provisions with still
readable paper labels indicating their contents. Even
after the passage of almost 100 years, they remain
microbiologically sterile and safe to eat, but are
understandably taste-free. They stand as a
testimony to the superb effectiveness of packaging,
fulfilling the three functions of product containment,
product protection, and provision of product
information. If Shackleton was alive today, consumer
packaging – especially the humble tinned steel can –
would be one of the few items of our world that
would be familiar to him.
That we still have the same technology today is not
packaging’s fault. Hammered on cost grounds by
suppliers and retailers, packaging has been forced
into innovation retreat for years, and lately has
become a soft target for environmentalists. While a
piece of packaging might initially bring positive
feelings and reassurance of product quality, once it
has to be discarded, it becomes just another pain in
the garbage. But there are forces driving packaging
change and these are growing.
For consumers, the existing functions of bringing the
product safely to the shelves and then being part of
the buying decision are largely taken for granted.
Now, consumers are tired of packs that make
demands on their time and attention, are difficult to
open or dispose of properly, and contain instructions
in font sizes that cannot easily be read.
For brands, differentiation and emotional
engagement with the consumer are becoming
essential properties. All too often, the identification
of unmet consumer needs seem to elude most
marketers who react by launching a plethora of new
products, most of which quickly disappear. This
contributes to the sea of colored noise that greets
shoppers in most supermarkets – row upon row of
near-identical products that fail to engage the
senses, lift the spirits, educate, inspire, or entertain.
The opportunities for change in packaging draw
heavily on the development of new and novel
materials. Smarter packaging will extend the
traditional functions of protecting, containing, and
informing to also include an ability to enhance the
product and its consumption, safety, convenience,
and security. To do these things, traditional
packaging materials – glass, metal, plastic, and
paper/board – will need to be modified by the
incorporation of smart and functional materials,
deposited largely as coatings and as part of printed
labels and thin-film electronic devices.
A further challenge will be the growing information
needs of an increasingly technology-literate
consumer base. In the future, the majority of
consumers will expect information on food
packaging regarding freshness, ripeness, ingredients,
nutritional content, allergenicity, health benefits,
organic content, pesticide residues, additives, and
the ethics of food production, all in the language of
their choice. The printed paper label will simply be
overwhelmed by these demands, suggesting shifts
toward visual and audio forms of communication
are the only answer. Already, smart labels that
change color are being used on seafood products
and fruit to give an indication of product freshness.
But it is the ubiquitous sell-by or use-by product
dating system that simply has to go, since it is
temperature, not time, that has the major influence
on perishable product degradation. Typically, a
product shelf life of 23 days at 4°C plummets to just
2 days at 22°C. Fifteen years ago, the US military,
sitting on a $1 billion stockpile of drugs past their
printed expiry dates, commissioned tests to check
whether they should be discarded. They found that
~90% were still safe and effective. Smart packaging
will use color-change labels, which integrate
temperature and time, to create a visible and
accurate indication of product expiry. Such
packaging already plays a critical role for the World
Health Organization in the distribution of
temperature-sensitive vaccines in developing
countries. Sadly, consumers are yet to benefit from
this technology, which not only better protects the
consumer but can also contribute to reducing the
amount of perishable product waste.
In the future, more sophisticated indicator labels will
need to be developed that combine chemical
sensing with simple electronic processing and low-
cost displays in a flexible, disposable format.
Including radio-frequency identification technology
could remotely warn users and automated systems
whenever stability problems have occurred. Real
sound and vision communication needs to wait for
the commercialization of cost-effective printed
electronics on packaging, powered by either printed
polymer photovoltaics or thin-film batteries.
So packaging in the future will be radically different
from that of today. Sound and vision on packaging
will be ubiquitous – together with aromas,
automatic updating, and other useful responsive
features. The technology enablers for this journey
are strongly materials based. So while packaging is
not a very fashionable subject, there are fascinating
challenges in the development of inexpensive,
disposable packaging incorporating smart labels,
coatings, and devices. Simple but useful functionality
could make a difference to people by preventing
errors, saving lives, and helping to limit waste.
APRIL 2006 | VOLUME 9 | NUMBER 4 64
Paul Butler | Packaging Materials & Technologies and academic visitor, University of Oxford, UK |
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