Dynamics Food can support your transition away from plastic packaging in the Food industry

With public outrage at the longevity of plastic packaging at an all-time high, the overhaul of its use in the Food industry remains set to take a whole lot of innovation, time and money.

In one of the Grocer’s latest magazines, they recalled the story of some strollers on a Cornish beach uncovering a 30-year-old bag of crisps underfoot. Three decades later and a leading crisp producer were paying the price as the brand faced a boycott campaign signed by over 300,000 people.

They are now trying to find an alternative to their polyproprylene and aluminium packaging by 2025. The Royal Mail have begged environmental protestors to stop posting empty crisp packets in protest in the meantime.

The dilemma of replacing plastic packaging

The widespread criticism of plastic-use has spawned a wave of companies targeting the press coverage ‘reduction in plastic at (x) company’. It’s easier said than done, with these same companies scratching their heads at developing the viable alternative.

To state the obvious, food manufacturers need to work with their packaging suppliers to develop an alternative packaging that will not significantly impact the life-cycle or quality of the food they sell.

Managing the evolution of your packaging during new product development

Initially, you will need a way to manage a vast pool of idea sources and capabilities for the new product development of your new packaging. Dynamics Food will ensure that you can centralise and manage your design brief. With Dynamics Food, you’ll have a system which enables you to log and acknowledge the great ideas and formally discard the bad ones.

Dynamics Food is our offer of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central/Dynamics 365 to provide a complete end-to-end ERP software for food companies. Some of the companies using Dynamics Food include well-known names as Bounce Foods, County Confectionery, Faccenda Foods, Forza Foods, Gressingham Foods, Laila's Fine Foods, Nantwich Cheese Company, Neal's Yard Dairy, Pipers Crisps and many more.

Dynamics Food gives you the platform to manage the feedback you receive whilst testing the different variants, so you can make the correct decision on the packaging you decide to go to market with. Once you’re set for launch, Dynamics Food will allow you to manage the costs of each product variant to guarantee your new overhead doesn’t batter your profit.

For further details on new product development, you can read one of our latest blogs.

Tracking the remainder of your old plastic packaging

When your new product development is ready to roll you want to be in a comfortable position where you can flick the switch and get the wheels in motion of getting your new packaging out in the marketplace.

Dynamics Food will track your packaging as a stock item to ensure you have full visibility and confidence in your reporting and analysis within your business. With a change to the materials of your packaging you need to establish what orders are affected – and the impact it will have on your margins and cashflow.