New Venture ‘Packaging Competence Center’ Supports Future-Proof Packaging Solutions

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Gerhard Schubert GmbH - Verpackungsmaschinen

Glatt Ingenieurtechnik GmbH

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Gerhard Schubert and the Berndt+Partner Group have collaborated under the Packaging Competence Center which provides technical consulting services for packaging processes and technologies.

Gerhard Schubert and the Berlin-based Berndt+Partner Group packaging consultancy are combining their expertise with the Packaging Competence Center (PCC). The new organization brings together experts in regulation, packaging design, materials and automation technology. The aim of the PCC is to advise manufacturers on the development of sustainable packaging and to find viable solutions for implementation, shares Gerhard Schubert. The focus is on meeting the challenges of Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation (PPWR) as well as other sustainability issues.

The EU PPWR aims to make the packaging industry more sustainable and to reduce the negative environmental impact of packaging waste. However, it presents manufacturers with major challenges due to extremely tight deadlines, different implementation timelines and the current lack of detailed regulations. Companies need to evaluate as quickly as possible how they will respond to the often complex requirements. This can have far-reaching consequences for their packaging and production processes – and requires efficient, compliant implementation, for which PCC provides a wide range of support, adds the firm.

Manufacturers are dealing with very practical considerations. What are the implications of packaging a chocolate bar in paper instead of a flowpack in the future? Or how does an existing cartoning machine run when blanks are resized, when they behave differently in the machine or when they can no longer be glued? These issues are significant and require answers along the entire value chain, mentions the company.

This is where the Packaging Competence Center comes in. The PCC’s key advantage is that, due to the comprehensive expertise of two companies, the Center can offer regulatory advice, packaging development and machine feasibility – all from a single source, opines Gerhard Schubert. While the experts from BP Consultants clarify the PPWR and explain its impact on the respective packaging portfolio, Schubert evaluates the machinability of new packaging solutions, thereby ensuring the automation which is essential for packaging processes.

The Packaging Competence Center is a collaborative partnership that provides technical consulting services for packaging processes and technologies – all targeted towards making the customers’ production processes more efficient and sustainable, shares the firm.

If, for example, a manufacturer wants to switch its packaging materials to paper or recyclable mono films, the PCC offers a so-called Impact Check. During this process, the experts analyze, as part of their evaluation, whether a manufacturer’s existing packaging range meets the regulatory requirements or whether it needs to be improved. Once all questions have been clarified, manufacturers can develop a new packaging design, with support available if desired from Berndt+Partner Creality, a subsidiary of the Berndt+Partner Group that specializes in packaging design and branding. The PCC always takes automated packaging processes into account, explains the company.

Once the modified packaging concept has been finalized, Schubert tests it on its own machines in Crailsheim. The packaging machine manufacturer determines whether the new materials and formats can still be processed efficiently and whether they may require technological adjustments. It is vitally important to take a holistic approach: Sustainability – the basic idea behind the Mission Blue Initiative – has to incorporate systems and upstream steps such as design to ensure that a solution is consistently ecological. Packaging made of paper or mono film alone is not enough. Once the consulting, design and testing are complete, the PCC continues to support manufacturers.

Regulations change quickly, so manufacturers will soon have new questions for which they want equally creative answers – and they will find them at the PCC, concludes BP Consultants, a subsidiary of the Berndt+Partner Group.

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