How to Best Understand Bottling, Contract and Green Packaging

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Executive Summary

We cover the major packaging areas in this article, which include bottling, contract, and green packaging.

Bottling Plant and Packaging Industry

The bottling Plant and packaging industry are one of the early forms of what is now known as contract packing. The packaging industry is divided into companies that perform their packaging and those that outsource to contract packagers. One of the significant areas of the contract packaging industry is bottling.

The Bottling Plant, and Bottlers and Bottling Companies

Bottlers or bottling companies are highly specialized in putting liquid into glass bottles, plastic bottles, and cans. At Coca-Cola, they have long sent kegs of formula mixed with carbonated water at the bottlers or bottling companies.

What Is Contract Packaging and Contract Packing?

Contract packaging and contract packing are when a company outsources its packaging and packing to another company. Contract packaging or contract packing is often concentrated where the packaging operation is of sufficient complexity and where there are significant economies of scale to what is, in effect, centralizing packaging to a specialty provider.

Contract Packaging Companies and Contract Packaging Services

Packaging can be one of the most specialized and capital-intensive parts of the manufacturing process. An excellent example of this is brewing beer.

For example, In the San Diego area, many microbrewers lack the scale to buy and use highly automated packaging equipment. These microbreweries often send out their beer for contract packaging.

Contract packaging companies and contract packaging services allow the brewery to worry about the complexities of packaging, or even purchasing packaging materials, dealing with packaging waste, etc.. Instead, contract packaging takes all of that off of their shoulders.

Bottling Equipment Like the Bottling Machine, Liquid Filling Machine, Bottle Filling Machine, and Filling Machine, Bottle Capping Machine and Capping Machine and Bottle Labeling Machine

Bottling packaging is highly specialized with highly specialized equipment. A bottling plant includes bottling equipment like bottling machines, liquid filling machines, filling machines, or bottle filling machines. There is also the capping machine or bottle capping machine.

Bottling Machine: A bottling machine is just a general term for what is more specialized bottling equipment.

Liquid Filling Machine or Bottle Filling Machine or Filling Machine: A liquid filling machine, bottle filling machine, or filling machine is the liquid loaded after the glass bottle or plastic bottle has been washed and sterilized.

Bottle Capping Machine and Capping Machine: The glass bottles and plastic bottle capping machine or capping machine is the last step of the bottling process before the bottle is labeled.

Bottle Labeling Machine: The glass bottles and plastic bottle labeling machine is used after the bottle capping machine is complete.

This video is included because it effectively shows a bottling plant. There is no connection between the video producer and Brightwork Research and Analysis.

How to Best Understand Contract Packaging

Contract Packaging Companies and Contract Packaging Services

Packaging can be one of the most specialized and capital-intensive parts of the manufacturing process. An excellent example of this is brewing beer.

For example, In the San Diego area, many microbrewers lack the scale to buy and use highly automated packaging equipment. These microbreweries often send out their beer for contract packaging.

The Expensive Packaging Machine, Packing Machine and Packaging Equipment

The scale economies in packaging substantially drive contract packaging or contract packing. A modern packaging machine or packing machine can be quite expensive to obtain high throughput models. And the machinery in packaging is now the primary packaging machine or packing machine and extends to on-demand box-making machines. Contract packaging companies are better able to focus on these types of packaging machines and related packaging equipment.

Packaging Complexity, Packaging Supplies, Packing Supplies, Packing Material, and Flexible Packaging

The packaging or packing operation is the final operation at the end of the production line. However, for many companies, the packaging operation is the most complex part of the production line.

The product proliferation is driven by marketing also means a high variation of the number of packaging supplies being required. This results in the requirement for more flexible packaging capability than the manufacturer than afford. Flexible packaging can change over to new packaging quickly to meet the needs of high product variability. However, flexible packaging is most attainable when the packaging operation has a high volume.

This also means managing the inventory of such a large number of packaging supplies, packing supplies, and packing material.

By removing what is, in many cases, the most complex operation from the production line, those companies that use contract packaging can significantly reduce the overall complexity of their manufacturing.

Contract packaging companies and contract packaging services concentrate on these types of manufacturing areas.

Green Packaging

Box-making machines for corrugated cardboard boxes have become more common.

In this article, we lay out the benefits and costs of using box-making machines related to eco-packaging and recycling. This new technology has implications related to the advantages of contract packaging and how much cardboard ends up in the recycling bin.

Increased Specialization of Packaging Machinery and Packaging Technology

Packaging machinery and packaging technology have become more automated and more expensive than it was previously. This has moved the question of performing packaging in-house or outsourcing packaging more towards the continuum’s outsourcing packaging side. One example of this is on-demand box packaging machinery. This improvement in packaging machinery is likely to increase in the future.

This improvement in packaging machinery is likely to increase in the future. Increases in the study of packaging engineering and packaging science are the primary reason why.

Eco-Friendly Packaging, Eco Packaging or Green Packaging Corrugated Boxes

These systems also happen to reduce the boxes’ shipping cost (as they are smaller in many cases), and they do classify as eco-friendly packaging, eco-packaging, or green packaging. People often think of eco-friendly packaging, eco-packaging, or green packaging as simply what the packing is made from. But the reality is more complicated than that.

This is not because the custom cut boxes are notably different ecologically regarding the material (the corrugated cardboard sheets it is still made from recycled paper), but because they use less material than standardized corrugated boxes. Box making is considered green packaging for several reasons:

The customer actually recycles only a portion of the corrugated boxes that are used in shipping items. Therefore, the less box material sent to the customer, the less will end up in the recycling bin.
Smaller boxes use less packing material or packaging material.
Because the boxes are often smaller, it means that more of them can fit into a truck. And this is important because, in the vast majority of cases, trucks are cubed out before weighing out or weighing out. To cube out means to fill out the volume of a trailer. To weigh out means to max out the weight capacity of a trailer. And most trucks to out with a high surplus of unused weighed capacity per load. Even with smaller custom corrugated boxes, trailers will still tend to cube out first.

This video shows the box inventory benefits.

Packing Material and Packaging Material

Packing material or packaging material fills the cardboard boxes to prevent the contents from getting banged around and potentially damaged. However, the larger the box is compared to the item shipped, the more packing material or packaging material is required to fill the box. And the recycling rate for packing material or packaging material is far lower than for corrugated boxes.

Recycled Paper, Cardboard Recycling, and the Recycle Bin

Recycling is often significantly held up as a virtue. However, like anything else, recycling takes energy (transporting boxes to the recycling facility, transporting them back, etc.)

Cardboard recycling can be significantly reduced from box recycling by reducing the amount of cardboard to be recycled in the first place. With the marked increase in online shopping, apartment complexes in the US now have their communal recycle bin quite filled.

According to the EPA, containers and packaging accounted for 30% of the total solid waste generated in the US in 2012. While cardboard boxes are made from recycled paper, the process can be improved by using a box-making machine.

Introduction to Box Making

On-demand box making machines for corrugated cardboard boxes has become more common. In this article, we lay out the benefits and costs of using box making machines.

What Are Box Making Packaging Machines?

A modern packaging machine or packing machine can be quite expensive to obtain high throughput models. And the machinery in packaging is now not only the primary packaging machine or packing machine. The on-demand box machine, or packaging machine, produces the corrugated box from corrugated cardboard sheets. I will focus on this article.

This new technology has implications related to the advantages of contract packaging and how much cardboard ends up in the recycling bin.

Increased Specialization in Packaging Machinery and Packaging Technology

Packaging machinery and packaging technology have become more automated and more expensive than it was previously. This has moved the question of performing packaging in-house or outsourcing packaging more towards the outsourcing packaging side of the continuum. One example of this is on-demand packaging machinery. This improvement in packaging machinery is likely to increase in the future.

This improvement in packaging machinery is likely to increase in the future. Increases in the study of packaging engineering and packaging science are the primary reason why.

The Growth of Packaging Engineering and Packaging Science

Packaging engineering and packaging science have become increasingly studied in university. This and industry investment is leading to quite exciting packaging technology developments in packaging capabilities.

The on-demand box making is one example of this packaging technology.

Packsize and on Demand Box Making, the Box Machine, and Corrugated Cardboard Sheets

An excellent example of packaging equipment is the Packsize or customization on-demand packaging machine.

The Packsize or (another company offering similar technology) box making machine makes boxes at high speed from large sheets of cardboard right where packaging is performed at the packline. This allows the contract packaging company to keep corrugated cardboard sheets of uniform size on pallets and create virtually any box. The tradeoff is that there is more labor involved in using the box machine versus purchasing standardized cardboard boxes.

Box making machines like those offered by Packsize do not have the high capital expense of high-speed packaging machines. However, they require a large dedicated area in the packline (the box making machines are plentiful), and storage for the corrugated cardboard sheets, etc. Although the storage is far less for the corrugated cardboard sheet than inventories cardboard boxes.

Contract Packaging and a Dedicated On-Demand Packline

Contract packaging companies that are entirely focused on providing contract packaging services and that have customized a packline will be in a better position, leverage something like a Packsize system. A packline that is dedicated to on-demand machines along with corrugated cardboard storage can be highly efficient. With a high volume, the on-demand box making packline can become more effective than a company that has only a semi-dedicated packline to box making.

This video from Packsize is included because it explains box making quite well. However, Brightwork Research and Analysis has no affiliation with Packsize and has received no income from Packsize.

On-Demand Box Making Versus Custom Boxes of Custom Packaging

On-demand, box making should not be confused with customer boxes or custom packaging. Custom boxes or custom packaging are customized for more sizes, but they are not custom fit the particular shipment. In each case, buying custom boxes means a commitment to a particular size. On-demand, box making requires no such commitment. But this allows for an enormous number of different box sizes, but it also means storing and cataloging all of the box sizes.

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Conclusion

Contract packaging is quite common in some manufacturing areas. It primarily comes down to the packing operation’s complexity and the scale economies that contract packaging companies can obtain. Bottling is a perfect example where it often makes sense to outsource bottling to contract bottlers.

Bottling is a perfect example where it often makes sense to outsource bottling to contract bottlers.

Using a contract packager does add a transportation lead time to the manufacturing lead time. However, contract packagers are often so fast in performing the original packaging that it can reduce the overall manufacturing lead time.

Box machines have some advantages. What makes something eco-friendly packaging, eco-packaging, or green packaging is not only what it is made of. Another way to be green packaging is to reduce the consumption of a resource or waste a resource. Box-making machines allow for more custom-cut corrugated boxes, effectively loading-trucks, reducing the number of trucks needed for a certain amount of freight. Box making allows for less cardboard recycling and less box recycling as less cardboard goes with each shipment.

Box-making machines allow for more custom cut corrugated boxes, effectively loading-trucks and educating the number of trucks needed for a certain freight amount. Box making allows for less cardboard recycling and less box recycling as less cardboard goes with each shipment.

Box making allows for less cardboard recycling and less box recycling as less cardboard goes with each shipment and therefore less ends up in the recycle bin. The overall demand boxes use far less packing material or packaging materials, which directly reduces waste.