simon creasey discovers how converters and packaging specifiers are innovating to improve rigid plastics&rsquo sustainability story and making businesses in the sector stronger than everrigids step up to green challenge few industry sectors weathered the global economic downturn as well as packaging. a quick glimpse at the dow jones indices over the last 10 years supports this assertion, with containers and packaging posting growth of 86 &ndash versus the 38 achieved by the ftse 100 &ndash while key industry sectors, such as construction and aluminium, slumped 25 and 50 respectively.one of the key factors behind the packaging industry&rsquos recent growth spurt has been the continued success of rigid plastic manufacturers. the performance of this important industry subsector has been driven by a combination of strong innovation and a growing number of consumer goods companies switching their products out of other packaging materials and into rigid plastics. and the good news is that the demand for rigid plastics isn&rsquot expected to wane any time soon. according to a new report from visiongain, sales of rigid plastic packaging are set to flourish in the next 10 years, with the company forecasting that the market will exceed the 168bn mark in 2014.so what&rsquos likely to fuel this future growth and what are the key challenges rigid plastic manufacturers need to overcome to ensure they continue to outperform other industry sectorsarguably the biggest single driver behind the rapid recent takeup of rigid plastics has been the material&rsquos weight advantage over rival materials, in particular metal and glass. but from the brand&rsquos perspective this hasn&rsquot just been about reducing the environmental impact. there are also significant cost benefits to be gained from switching materials.take the example of a yoghurt pot. a typical yoghurt pot made from glass weighs around 85g whereas an equivalent pot made from plastic only weighs around 5.5g. if you filled a lorry full of glass yoghurt pots the packaging would account for 36 of the load whereas plastic pots would only account for 3.56 &ndash the upshot is that to transport the same amount of yoghurt you would need three trucks for glass pots and only two for plastic pots, according to plasticseurope.in this instance, moving from glass into plastic clearly represents a major difference in cost and it&rsquos a difference that becomes further heightened when you take into account the fact that consumer goods companies are increasingly coming under pressure from their retail customers to cut costs, so that these savings can be passed onto end users as part of the ongoing retail price war.confidence to investone of the key benefits of this switching trend is that it&rsquos given packaging manufacturers the confidence to invest in developing innovative new rigid plastic pack structures and materials, such as biodegradable materials and materials derived from renewable sources. the move towards developing more environmentally friendly materials has been widely welcomed by the industry says haulwen nicholas, packaging development manager at muller dairy.&ldquomaterials derived from sustainable sources are the preferred material option as manufacturers need to know they have a resource to use in the future and the sustainable materials tend to have properties that are more like those of current plastics, so it is easier to substitute them on current equipment. and depending on the material, some are suitable for the recycling chain,&rdquo says nicholas.similar caveats have been issued surrounding the future use of biodegradable materials, according to philip law, director general of the british plastics federation. &ldquothe use of biobased and degradable materials is a controversial one, partly because of the complexity of the materials, including the availability of hybrids of both conventional and biobased materials,&rdquo says law.&ldquocurrently usage is a tiny percentage of that for conventional plastics and with the fact that over a third of all plastics consumed goes into packaging, significant further inroads will require major investment in raw material production capacity. politicians are clearly attracted by the bio story because of its apparent simplicity, but at the practical level more consideration needs to be given to the desirability or otherwise of using land that could support food crops for the growth of industrial raw materials.&rdquodespite these hurdles, kevin vyse, primary foods packaging technologist and innovation lead at m&s, says that there is widespread recognition that the packaging industry cannot rely on a source of oilderived polymers for ever. &ldquopolyethylene and polyester analogies are being developed and they are now, in many cases, equally viable alternatives to the traditional material,&rdquo says vyse. &ldquocost, recyclability and consistent starch sources are still barriers to full adoption, but i am confident that these will be addressed over the next couple of years, meaning that packaging converters will have a broader range of materials to work with, quite apart from having a sustainable source.&rdquo  hybrid futureanother area that&rsquos projected to see greater adoption and advances in the future is plasticcardboard pack combinations. elliot wilson, strategy director at brand design agency the cabinet, expects to see this combination of materials to continue to grow until a better single material solution is developed.&ldquopracticality plays a key role in the rise of multimaterial packs as traditionally these are easier to access and more favourable in terms of disposal to the customer,&rdquo says wilson. &ldquomultimaterial packs are a great solution to help with sustainability and to help with lightweighting for supply purposes,&rdquowhen it comes to the latter the industry has already made major inroads into reducing the weight of packs, but this can&rsquot go on forever, cautions muller&rsquos nicholas.&ldquowhere there is still an opportunity to reduce the weight of packaging, manufacturers will continue to do this as it makes economic sense,&rdquo says nicholas. &ldquohowever, there is currently only so far that one can reduce the packaging without it impacting on the product inside.&rdquoas a result, louis lindenberg, global packaging sustainability director at unilever, believes that we could soon see a seachange in attitudes towards lightweighting.&ldquoi think we will see more and more businesses zoom out of micro focus and start to consider the bigger picture when thinking about design,&rdquo says lindenberg. &ldquothe realisation that making something too lightweight can severely impact the recycling stream is cause for invention. rethinking will increasingly give birth to new technologies, which, for example, still allow weight reduction initiatives without affecting the polymer density or separation systems.&rdquohe points to the company&rsquos own partnership with external technology experts mucell and alpla to commercialise mucell technology as a good example of this.&ldquothe technology allows us to inject gas while blowmoulding bottles,&rdquo explains lindenberg. &ldquothis gas creates bubbles in the middle of the pack walls thus reducing the plastic component by 15 while still maintaining the full functionality of the bottle, and they remain 100 recyclable.&rdquolike muller, a number of other companies are starting to rethink the traditional approach that&rsquos been taking to lightweighting, with m&s&rsquos vyse saying that the future focus for the retailer is on &lsquorightweighting&rsquo packaging to &ldquoachieve the right level of protection, promotion, price and supply chain protection as well as consumer satisfaction in product delivery&rdquo.for vyse, delivering on these different areas is vitally important.&ldquotoo much packaging and it does the product no service at all and too little packaging allows the product to be damaged and potentially go to waste before the consumer is ready to use it &ndash food waste has a far greater impact than packaging,&rdquo says vyse. &ldquoso at m&s, we have shifted from lightweighting to optimisation &ndash this focus ensures we are striking the right balance of using the optimal amount of packaging that does not produce unnecessary packaging waste whilst being effective in helping consumers reduce food waste.&rdquosuch efforts should ultimately go a long way towards helping the rigid plastics industry overcome one of the major challenges facing its continued growth &ndash negative consumer perception of plastic packaging.the continued criticism of plastic packs is completely undeserved, says martin kersh, executive director at the fpa. &ldquothe media bandwagon is building and plastic is in danger of becoming demonised. the industry therefore needs to work even harder to communicate the benefits of plastic &ndash particularly in relation to food protection and safety &ndash otherwise the accusation of beingunenvironmental is going to stick in the perceptions of the public,&rdquo he says.it&rsquos a view shared by jane bickerstaffe, director of incpen, the industry council for research on packaging and the environment. &ldquoin general, policy on packaging has to stop focussing on what happens to packaging after it has done its job,&rdquo she says. &ldquowe&rsquore letting the tail wag the dog. plastic packaging &ndash and indeed other materials &ndash have a net positive environmental impact in protecting products and the resources invested in making products, such as food and other goods. if value can be recovered from them after use &ndash as energy or materials &ndash then that&rsquos a bonus, but not a necessity.&rdquochris peach, head of packaging and design at marketing sciences, identifies a separate point that ultimately falls outside of the remit of rigid plastic packaging providers the differing recycling regimes that operate across the uk. &ldquocurrently the materials that can be recycled vary from one local authority to another, while the sorting process households have to undertake is increasingly complex. confusion will alienate households, so greater consistency and simplicity is required to bring more consumers on board with recycling,&rdquo says peach.however, if issues like this can be overcome the outlook for rigid plastics looks incredibly buoyant, with growing numbers of consumer goods companies expected to continue to make the shift from other materials in the coming years, which will allow the industry to continue to post impressive financial results.on the moneyits recent track record in the financial markets hasn&rsquot gone unnoticed by investors, says nicholas mockett, head of packaging m&a at moorgate capital. &ldquothis sort of performance has attracted investment from private equity, which is at a level now that i have not seen for 20 years as a packaging m&a advisor,&rdquo claims mockett.and there are likely to be a growing number of opportunities for investors in the future, as rigid plastic companies continue to expand through a combination of organic growth &ndash thanks largely to opportunities in emerging overseas markets &ndash and through acquisitions, adds mockett.&ldquocompanies are increasingly being asked by their customers to provide the same quality of packaging with the requisite compliance and standards in more territories,&rdquo he says. &ldquothis often has to be done by way of green field expansion as the incumbent operators do not have the right set up or simply are not for sale. there has also been a fair amount of m&a in rigid plastic packaging with bway acquiring ropak and rpc acquiring superfos, m&h and ace.&rdquoaccording to smithers pira the global rigid plastic packaging industry is forecast to grow during the period 201318 by 5.2 to 174bn. given the bullish projections, it would be no surprise to see similarly high levels of m&a activity in the future. 
