Sainsbury's first with Amcor film for strawberry packs
Jill Park, packagingnews.co.uk, 17 August 2009
Sainsbury’s has become the first supermarket to roll out Amcor Flexibles’ new heat-sealed polyester lidding film on its strawberries, cherries and plums packaging.
Changing from a rigid clip-on lid to the Amcor film reduces the weight of the packs by up to 87%, which saves Sainsbury’s 333 tonnes of plastic per annum.
"We aim to ensure that packaging amounts and types are appropriate," said Sainsbury’s packaging manager Stuart Lendrum.
The film is printable so labels are not required and is strong enough for the packs to be stacked in store.
Amcor Flexibles carried out extensive trials to ensure the film was robust enough to survive the supply chain, according to account manager Beth Jones.
"We’ve done quite lengthy trials with the grocers associated with this to see if the film can withstand the supply chain and it did," she said. "It’s likely to be rolled out across other retailers in due course."
Sainsbury’s adopted Amcor Flexibles’ PushPop pack for blueberries in March, a matter of months after it used the plastic pouch for its own-brand range of chocolates.
Fruit packs featuring the Amcor film are in Sainsbury’s now
