This selection of the best-read food packaging articles of the year are infused with a strong brand flavor, including for Lipton, Chobani and Walmart’s Great Value, which appear alongside thorough reports from a selection of innovative packaging in the snack, candy and foodservice markets culled from first-person accounts at trade shows.
Over the past year through dozens of articles posted at PackagingDigest.com, we’ve chronicled exemplary food packaging innovations and trends. We’ve skimmed off the cream of the crop in assembling a short 5-story list of those stories that best resonated with our audience, beginning in reverse order at #5.
Our listing starts off with a shiny new package, courtesy of Executive Editor and long-time Lipton tea user Lisa Pierce. Lisa provides a first-person perspective using Lipton’s new tea packaging comprising four golden foil-wrapped packs that each keep 25 bags protected. She chronicles an illuminating experience in this image-drive first person account.
While it’s stated that all publicity is good, it also turned out that all that glitters is not gold for Lipton because the article received an unexpected backlash from reader comments about the packaging that made it to another list as well: 5 new packages suffer crushing criticism.
A major brand owner that merges two hot trends is next…
#4
The number of brand owners that have made a move into flexible packaging continues to grow including this brand owner in the dairy products market. Chobani debuts yogurt in pouches and tubes details the company’s new product salvo made earlier this year that leverages the growing popularity of Greek yogurt—50% of yogurt sales—in convenient, consumer-friendly flexible formats that also add iconic characters.
Next is a major private-label retailer that rarely discloses its packaging plans…
#3
A mid-year conference session at the PackEx trade event in Toronto, Canada, turned into a rare news-scoop opportunity. It came about when a Walmart Canada manager disclosed plans for a revamp of the Great Value brand in versions 2.0 and 2.1. She also provided details on the company’s Blackweb electronics and Pure Balance Premium Pet Food labels.
I hadn’t heard the retailer talk this much about packaging since the Walmart Scorecard was unveiled at Pack Expo back in 2006 and then provided an update two years later.
So when Walmart talks, people listen, and when we report on what was said, readers read; we served several scoops in Walmart reveals new packaging for great value and more.
Next: A lot of readers have a sweet tooth for packaging
#2
The annual Sweets & Snacks Expo produced by the National Confectioners Association provided a glimpse of the newest tempting treats to hit the market. In addition to nifty new noshes and fascinating flavors, the event showcases innovative packaging and notable container trends. Contributor Jenni Spinner reported in photos and copy on 10 packs and trends worth watching from the show floor.
Here’s a major food segment that finally got the attention it deserves…
#1
I think it’s safe to say that retail packaging and related venues get a lot of attention in media, and deservedly so, but there’s a less-covered and no-less crucial and major segment detailed in this report that struck a nerve with readers. That segment? Foodservice.
It was earlier in the year when a visit to the National Restaurant Show uncovered unconventional products and packaging in the foodservice segment from a no-handle Super Jug to fully-loaded brownie pouches to the first shelf-stable hummus multipack to Ghirardelli’s pouch-driven dispensing system to a tiny semi-automatic packaging machine that amply fills a void in DIY foodservice packaging. See them all in 7 packaging innovations fit for foodservice.
