It's in the Bag

Bobko also agreed with the need to be involved early in the design stage. "We must be intimately involved with the design from the inception to insure a quality end product, and to know the equipment that the customer is using to form, fill, and seal the pouches," he said.

"During the design of new packaging, one needs to fully understand the customer's performance requirements and develop a structure that meets all of them," said Jake Zehr, business development manager for American Packaging Corp. (APC), and a second-place winner in pP's 2005 Excellence Awards competition for a stir fry pouch. "Areas of consideration include: barrier requirements (moisture, oxygen, grease, etc.), puncture resistance, fade resistance, drop testing, slip characteristics, freezer options, reclosures options, and openability."