Pots, Tubs and Trays

Today’s busy modern lifestyles have fuelled the huge growth in convenience foods, ready meals and on-the-go snacks.  And the wide choice of plastic pots, tubs and trays (PTTs) have made the development of this market possible and created a fast-moving and innovating sector with frequent new product launches.

Benefits of Pots, Tubs and Trays

• Pack solutions can be created for a wide variety of products including ready meals, desserts, snacks, spreads, dips, salads, and dairy products.
• A choice of materials to meet different product characteristics.
• Single and barrier solutions for different shelf life requirements.
• Design flexibility and a choice of shapes, sizes and decoration options create brand identity and differentiation, premium positioning, on-shelf appeal and ease of use.
• Packs are lightweight, safe, easy to handle and break resistant.
• Packs may be microwaved or cooked in a conventional oven.
• Packs can be pasteurised and may be retorted for sterilisation during filling.
• Packs are fully recyclable.

Environmental Facts

• The majority of pots, tubs and trays are made out of PET and PP which are both 100% recyclable materials. 1.5 tonnes of carbon is saved per tonne of plastic recycled.
• The UK plastic recycling target to 2017 requires an extra 560k tonnes of plastic to be collected; analysis of plastic streams suggests the majority of this will come from increases in PTT recycling.
• 60% of UK Local Authorities now collect PTTs according to the Recoup 2013 Household Plastics Collection Survey.
• On average 9.82kg of pots, tubs and trays are collected per UK household per year.
• Collection rates of pots, tubs and trays for recycling increased by 208% between 2009 and 2012.
• The lighter weight of plastics generally means less use of resources.
• It is estimated that plastic packaging accounts for only 1.5% of oil and gas use.
• More than 50% of all products manufactured in Europe are packed in plastics. According to weight however, plastics account for only 17% of the total of packaging materials used.
• Lighter weight and bulk reduce supply chain effects, notably fuel for transport (in a typical application, the same truck will transport over 50% more yogurt when packed in plastic as opposed to glass).
• Initial work on LCA demonstrates that, in many applications, the carbon effect is lower when plastics are used (up to 25% improvement reported by Nestlé for a baby food pack).
• If plastics were not used in packaging and other materials were used instead, then waste and energy consumption would double, and weight and costs would quadruple.

From a Margarine Tub To a Paint Container

There is already strong demand for recycled PTTs to make new packaging.  Find out how a used margarine tub has a valuable second life as part of a paint container.  Visit http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9_W_mVSx6E