Hatzopoulos S.A. has won the ultimate packaging award at this year's competition organized by the World Packaging Organisation (WPO).
The "Power Gel Stick-pack" that was presented by the company is a Worldstar Winner 2018 in the Packaging Materials and Components category.
This novel packaging solution concerns a quadriplex structure with laser scoring for a unique-shaped stick of energy gel for athletes. The packaging material provides high barrier properties against moisture, oxygen and aroma. In addition the raw and secondary materials have been selected carefully, to withstand the hot-filling and pasteurization procedures. The stick form remains intact during transportation and it can resist as well any pressure exerted by the athlete who may carry the pack on them during practice / or on the field (e.g. bicycle race). Hermetic sealing is safeguarded at all times, irrespective of gel viscosity or pasteurization conditions.
The stick is hyper-functional, as triple laser scoring is applied to the packaging material, in order to ensure fast, easy and safe opening by the athlete and the top area shapes a nozzle, so that the gel may be consumed immediately by the athlete. Critical point is the “trash chain” that is created on the top corner of the stick, which is necessary so that environmental pollution is avoided. Rotogravure printing has been selected for this range, with the metallic effect giving an impressive and dynamic visual appeal.