FREE QUOTE - CALL 920-468-5927

HART
  • Products
    • Filling
      • Automatic Lidding
      • Auto-Pouch Assembly Equipment
      • PFC-10 Spouted Pouch Filler
      • HCC Filling Line
      • HPC Filling Line
      • SA-12 Filler
      • Bulk Filling
    • Slice on Slice (SOS)
      • Casting Line
      • 3 x 12 Wrapper
      • 2-,3-, & 4- Stage Stackers
      • 20-ESW IWS Extruder
      • Servo Cutoff
      • Ribbon Loaf Auto Harp Infeed
    • Cutting
      • Natural Cheese Cutters
      • Mozzarella Log Slicer
      • Cutting & Elevating Conveyors
      • Lane Diverter
      • Two-Stage Cutters
      • Vertical Cutters
      • Wheel Cutters
        • Semi-Automatic Wheel Cutters
        • Automatic Wheel Cutters
      • 640 Block / 550 Barrel Cutters
        • 640 AL Cutters
        • 640 HC Cutters
        • 640 Pneumatic Cutters
      • Slab Cutters
      • Ultrasonic Cutters
      • Exact Weight Cutters
      • Dicer
    • Conveyance / Robotics & Product Handling
      • Case Packing
      • Cutting & Elevating Conveyors
      • Lane Diverter
      • Debox & Defoiling
      • Flex Pickers
      • Robotic Palletizing
      • Automated Product Loading
      • Lidding
      • Cheese Wheel Salting, Spicing & Washing
    • Shred Line
      • Retail Cheese Shred Lines
      • Food Service Shred Lines
      • Cutting & Elevating Conveyors
      • Lane Diverter
      • Two-Stage Cutter
      • Slab Cutter
      • 640 HC Cutter
  • Product Videos
  • About Us
    • Meet the Team
    • Upcoming Events
    • History
  • Industry News
  • Contact Us
    • Directions & Nearby Hotels
    • Employment
    • Request Information
  • Store
  • Get a FREE Quote
Home > News > Dairy Snacks Need Their Own Packaging
HART String Cheese

Dairy Snacks Need Their Own Packaging

April 17, 2017

News

Milk, cheese, yogurt and cottage cheese are healthy alternatives to fried or baked snacks and candies. So these dairy snacks need to be packaged in single-serve or snack-size formats.

Dairy foods and beverages are sold in smaller and more convenient snack-size packaging. You’ll find yogurt on a stick and cheese in single-serve packs. Dairy is even used to make packaging; The USDA has developed a film made from milk protein.

Snacking is an $87 billion business, and on the rise, with snacks accounting for 51% of all food sales. Therefore, many brands have realized they need to go small or go home. Packaging choices play a significant role in growing a brand’s market share. Packaging is a means to differentiate as well as to optimize the value chain. Put another way, packaging can increase sales while also reducing costs.

Smaller is better

One such snack is a cheese stick from Jarlsberg Cheese. Its Cheese Snacks are individually wrapped ¾-ounce pieces of cheese in stick format packaged eight to a bag. The cheese are said to appeal to consumers for picnics, back-to-school lunches and on-the-go snacking.

Cottage cheese brands have also taken notice of the snack trend.

“Cottage cheese has been around forever, and mainly thought of as a diet food,” said Gerard Meyer, CEO of Muuna. “The same was true for yogurt, but yogurt innovated while cottage cheese remained stuck in the past. At Muuna, we decided to reimagine cottage cheese, inside and out, down to our unique, beautiful cup.”

 The company packages its new flavored cottage cheese in 5.3-ounce cups (in addition to a larger 16-ounce tub). The single-serve cup portion is in line with what yogurt brands are using. Muuna deposits pieces of real fruit on the bottom of its container and offers cottage cheese in five flavors: strawberry, blueberry, pineapple, peach and mango.

Hand-held yogurt

Yogurt in stick pouches is not new. But how about manufacturing yogurt as a hand-held treat? Yollies Yogurt Lolly lollypops (a lunchbox treat) are made with thickened yogurt and fruit puree. Ireland-based Kerry Foods developed the technology for the yogurt and chose equipment maker Unifill to help develop the shape and the filling solution. Amcor supplied the thermoforming packaging material.

The resulting stay-fresh pod shape is distinctive, helping to build a Yollies’ brand personality as the laminate is transformed to form the Yollies’ shape. Amcor’s peel-and-release film technology allows the product to come out of the pod easily. Yollies was a finalist for Best Dairy Packaging Design at the World Dairy Innovation Awards.

Packaging made from milk protein

It’s not always what’s in the package that’s remarkable. Sometimes it is the package itself. The American Chemical Society recently presented research on a packaging film made of milk proteins at its national meeting.

“The protein-based films are powerful oxygen blockers that help prevent food spoilage. When used in packaging, they could prevent food waste during distribution along the food chain,” said research leader Peggy Tomasula.

To create a better packaging solution, Tomasula and her colleagues at the U.S. Department of Agriculture are developing an environmentally friendly film made of the milk protein casein. The films are said to be up to 500 times better than plastics at protecting food against oxygen and they are biodegradable and more sustainable, breaking down easier than plastics. The milk-based packaging has smaller pores and can thus create a tighter network that keeps oxygen out, compared to the edible packaging made of starch currently on the market.

Milk protein films are edible and may have vitamins, probiotics and nutraceuticals added in the future. Flavors could also be added, researchers say. The films themselves have little flavor.

Four factors that are expected to drive dairy packaging:

  • Single-serve packaging. It is preferred over other formats.
  • Light weighting provides convenience to the consumers.
  • Usage of effective packaging methods increases shelf life.
  • Alternative shelf space at retail, like non-chilled inside aisles, where competitors are not focused.

Source: DairyFoods.com

Strategies to Make Dairy a Customer Go-To Sales of Natural Cheese Shreds and Slices Top the Rest

Related Posts

hart-world-champion-cheese-2020

News

2020 World Championship Cheese Contest Now Accepting Entries

hart-design-cheeseexpo-2020-cheese-platter

News

Record 317 Industry Suppliers to Exhibit at CheeseExpo 2020

hart-design-state-of-dairy-industry-cheese-wedge

News

IDFA Weighs in on State of the Dairy Industry with Dairy Foods Magazine

Who We Are

HART Design & Manufacturing is a global leader in the design and construction of standard and customized stainless steel, servo-controlled equipment for use in the food and dairy industry, with an emphasis on process and natural cheese production lines.

Our 40,000 square feet of integrated production facilities, located in Green Bay, Wisconsin, allow us to provide our customers with superior design and engineering, machining, welding, fabricating, mechanical and electrical assembly, testing and programming, all under one roof!

HART Design & Manufacturing uses proven technologies coupled with continual innovation to produce robust, reliable equipment to satisfy our clients’ specific processing or packaging requirements.

HARTHART
HART Design & Manufacturing, Inc.
1940 Radisson Street
Green Bay, WI 54302
920-468-5927
Info@HartDesign.com

Disclaimer & Intellectual Property Statement

Industry & Company News

  • 2020 World Championship Cheese Contest Now Accepting Entries November 28, 2019
  • Record 317 Industry Suppliers to Exhibit at CheeseExpo 2020 November 20, 2019
  • IDFA Weighs in on State of the Dairy Industry with Dairy Foods Magazine November 18, 2019

Let’s Keep in Touch

Subscribe to our monthly newsletter to discover the latest & greatest videos, news and deals!

© HART Design & Manufacturing, Inc. 2019
Website Design, Development, SEO, & Hosting by The BLU Group - Advertising & Marketing