Spotlight on Stick Packaging Machines

Packaging is not only about hygiene and protecting the product. It’s about convenience. Nothing illustrates this better than the stick pack, a form that’s growing in popularity around the world.

Remember the slim, one-portion sachets of sugar, milk powder or coffee powder at the cafeteria or in the hotel room? Or those small use-and-throw packs of ketchup or mustard that accompanied the pizza or burger you ordered?

Those slim, single-portion sachets are called stick packs. The stick pack offers consumers convenience (it is easy to open and provides just the right amount of product) plus the freshness of the product is guaranteed. The stick pack is a safe and hygienic packaging form used in both the food industry and the pharmaceutical sector. Although at first glance, stick packs might not seem very environment-friendly because they are packaged individually, they comprise 35% less packaging material than a sachet.

Applications of stick packaging

Stick pack machines are perfect for packaging a wide variety of powder, granular, and liquid products. Powder products can be dense, fine, loose, and particulate materials. Liquids can be substances of differing viscosities including water-like fluids, gels, and pastes.

Stick packaging is very popular for powdered drink mixes, liquid and powder pharmaceuticals and nutraceuticals, and granular ingredients like sugar, seasonings, coffee/tea premixes. The medical and dietary supplement industries also highly favour stick packaging.

Why stick packs are a hit

Single serve and controlled dosage packaging is very popular with today’s consumers, spanning across generations and demographics. Millennials and young professionals love stick packs because they are portable, convenient, and fit unobtrusively into their busy lives. Whether they contain daily medication or favourite coffee, they allow ‘on the go’ consumers to take their lifestyle on the road. The aging population uses stick packs because they are lightweight and often feature easy-open options like tear notches, making it easier for those with limited dexterity to handle and use the product. Parents are attracted to stick packs because they can easily feed their children with a single, easy to open, controlled serving size package that requires little clean up.

Stick packs also offer unmatched economy and convenience for service providers in the hospitality, food or airlines industries. They help these players to provide food and neutraceutical powders in hygienic, single-serve packaging.

How stick pack machines work

The operation of stick pack machines is very similar to that of single lane vertical form fill seal packaging machines: a roll of film is cut and formed into multiple stick packs; the bags are filled with product and then sealed, all in a vertical fashion, at speeds of up to 80 bags per minute per lane.

Stick pack machines produce more than one pack at a time and usually have multiple channels to produce several stick packs at a time. Some machines in the market can accommodate up to 20 lanes, producing over 1,200 stick packs per minute!

How to choose the right stick pack machine

When selecting your stick pack machine, it’s always better to consult an expert or talk to a packaging machine manufacturer who will understand your requirements and guide you. You will need to consider the desired stick width & length, the product to be packed and its properties, desired speed (packs per minute, hour, shift, etc.) and convenience options (tear notches, chain of packs, pour spouts etc.).

All stick pack machines can utilise different fillers, depending on the product to be packaged.

• Liquid Fillers (for liquid, gel and paste type products such as honey, jam, ketchup, mustard paste, olive oil, shampoo)

• Auger Fillers (for powders and dusty products like milk powder, tea/coffee premix, spice powders, nutraceutical & pharma powders)

• Volumetric Fillers (for free-flowing non-dusty powders like sugar, table salt, pepper)

Stick pack machines can be built to accommodate different stick widths, convenient designs including pour spouts and specialty die-cut shapes, and can also feature easy-open options like tear notches and micro-perforations.

You may want to print expiration dates or lot codes on your stick packaging. There are many multi-lane printing options available for the task.

Conclusion

As with all capital investments, it pays to go with a reliable and experienced packaging partner like Nichrome. Nichrome will work with you to understand your product and operations define key points and then provide the most accurate configuration for your specific needs. After all, you will be relying on this equipment to handle a vital part of your production process, so it must deliver.

As India’s leading packaging machine manufacturer, Nichrome designs, develops, manufactures, sells, and services flexible packaging machinery for food and non-food industries worldwide. Nichrome’s decades of industry experience, and focus on packaging innovation and project integration makes them uniquely poised to be your trusted packaging partner, for projects and enterprises large or small. www.nichrome.com