Stickpacks & Sachets

Elevate Your Packaging Efficiency with INVpack Stick Pack Machinery

September 27, 2023

Written in collaboration with INVpack

In today’s fast-paced industries, efficient packaging is crucial to meet the ever-evolving demands of the market. One company that stands out as a leading player in this field is INVpack, renowned stick pack machinery manufacturers. With a strong commitment to perfection, customization, cutting-edge technology, and exceptional support, INVpack has been revolutionizing packaging processes across various sectors, including food, pharmaceutical, cosmetic, dairy, and nutritional industries for over two decades.

Customized Solutions for Unique Needs

INVpack understands that every product and company has unique packaging requirements. To address this, they offer stick pack packaging machinery that can be fully customized and adapted to your specifications. Their team of highly trained and experienced engineers collaborates closely with customers to design and manufacture machines that precisely meet their exact needs. At INVpack, it’s not just about delivering a machine; it’s about achieving perfection in every package.

State-of-the-Art Technology Ensures Efficiency and Precision

What sets INVpack apart as stick pack machinery manufacturers is their unwavering commitment to state-of-the-art technology. They employ the latest industry advancements, including advanced control systems, intuitive interfaces, and high-precision sensors, to guarantee optimal performance at every step of the packaging process. Their machines are equipped with precise dosing mechanisms that ensure uniform product distribution, thereby minimizing waste and maximizing efficiency.

Speed and Reliability for Increased Productivity

In today’s competitive landscape, speed and reliability on the production line are non-negotiable. INVpack’s stick pack machines are designed to achieve high speeds without compromising packaging quality. With their cutting-edge technology, you can significantly enhance your productivity, saving both time and operating costs. When you invest in INVpack machinery, you invest in the future of your production line.

Exceptional Technical Support and Service

INVpack doesn’t just stop at providing high-quality equipment; they go the extra mile to deliver exceptional technical support and service. Their team of experts is available to assist you at every stage of your journey, from initial technical advice, installation, and commissioning, to ongoing maintenance. Their commitment to ensuring that your machinery runs optimally helps minimize downtime and ensures you get the most out of your investment.

For over 20 years, INVpack has been a trusted name in the world of stick pack packaging machinery manufacturing. Their dedication to perfection, customization, cutting-edge technology, and exceptional support has set them apart as industry leaders. If you’re looking to elevate your packaging efficiency and quality, INVpack is the partner you need. Contact them today to discover how their expertise can help your production line not only meet but exceed market demands. With INVpack, you’re not just buying machinery; you’re investing in the future of your business.

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Matrix provides flexible packaging machinery solutions to customers worldwide. Vertical form, fill, seal; horizontal form, fill, seal; pre-made pouches; stickpacks and sachets, Matrix can help you find your flexible packaging solution.

Nutritional Wellness in a Sachet: The Power of Sachet Packaging

September 13, 2023

Written in collaboration with INVpack

In an era where health and well-being are at the forefront of society’s concerns, the nutritional sector plays a pivotal role in ensuring that individuals can enjoy good health and take proactive steps in illness prevention. As consumer demands shift towards convenience and immediate consumption, sachet packaging emerges as a compelling choice for delivering essential nutritional products. In this blog post, we will explore the world of sachet packaging in the nutritional sector, shedding light on its benefits and the advanced machinery behind it, notably the INVpack machines distributed by Matrix Packaging Machinery.

Understanding the Nutritional Sector

The nutritional sector is dedicated to providing vitamin supplements and health-enhancing products to support human well-being. This encompasses a wide range of products, including vitamins, protein supplements, probiotics, and more. These products can take various forms, from powders (used as food supplements) to granules, liquids, pastes, and solids.

While the nutritional sector shares similarities with the pharmaceutical sector in terms of product appearance, it is less constrained by stringent health and hygiene regulations when it comes to packaging and marketing.

Sachet Packaging: A Nutritional Sector Ally

In the quest to provide consumers with convenient, single-dose solutions, sachet packaging has emerged as a trusted ally for the nutritional sector. Sachets are flat packages sealed on all four sides, designed to accommodate small quantities of product. They offer a lightweight, practical, and eco-friendly packaging solution, thanks to the choice of materials and an easy-to-open system.

One of the standout features of sachet packaging is its environmental friendliness. These sachets can be crafted using 100% recyclable, recycled, or even biodegradable materials, depending on the film’s characteristics. This eco-conscious approach minimizes the packaging’s impact on the ecosystem, aligning with the growing global emphasis on sustainability.

Meet the Machines Behind Nutritional Sachet Packaging

To bring nutritional products to consumers in sachet format, vertical packaging machinery is essential. INVpack, distributed by Matrix Packaging Machinery, offers a range of machines under the MVA series, catering to varying production needs.

From large-scale productions (MVA12 and MVA9) to smaller runs (MVA4 EVO), these machines are equipped to handle the demands of the nutritional sector. The MVA4 EVO, in particular, stands out as the most compact model in the range, offering a highly competitive footprint-to-production ratio.

These machines are highly adaptable, allowing them to tailor their technologies and features to suit the specific requirements of the nutritional sector and the characteristics of the desired product. The result is an optimal packaging process that ensures product quality, convenience, and efficiency.

Sachet packaging is revolutionizing the nutritional sector, offering a convenient, eco-friendly, and practical way to deliver essential health-enhancing products to consumers. With INVpack machinery, distributed by Matrix Packaging Machinery, manufacturers in the nutritional sector have access to cutting-edge technology that ensures reliable and efficient sachet packaging. As the world continues to prioritize health and wellness, sachet packaging proves to be a vital tool in the nutritional sector’s mission to promote well-being and vitality.

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How a Small Footprint Opened Up New Revenue for Skin Care Company

July 6, 2023

Danny Richards has made his mark in skin care that covered everything from head to the toe. But he was lacking the right product to properly address his foot … particularly his footprint.

A trip attending the 2019 PACK EXPO in Las Vegas solved that dilemma. Today, he is enjoying a successful relationship with Matrix Packaging Machinery as his INVpack MVA sachet machine is producing the packaging his brands require – all in a compact footprint.

“Our new machine is built to exactly what my needs are,” said Richards, Vice President of Absolutely Natural. “I can run 40,000 packages in a shift and take care of my customers the way we want to care for them and do so by only taking up five feet of my footprint. That is a homerun when it comes to sachet machines.”

Richards’ story begins 30 years ago when his father Charlie founded Absolutely Natural (https://www.absolutely-natural.com/), a Melbourne, Florida-based premier skin care product company. The brand burst onto the scene initially selling sunscreen and tanning oils in Hawaii in the early 1990s. Major milestones, such as expanding their mail-order business, as well as private label packaging their skin care formulations to high-end resorts around the world, attributed to continued growth for Absolutely Natural.

The company offers more than 300 custom formulations for face, hair, body, sun, and baby care. Absolutely Natural has become such a trusted brand that it recently sold its 30 millionth bottle of product. The company remains a family run business with Charlie and his sons, including Danny, leading the way. Absolutely Natural occupies three buildings and warehouses totaling more than 33,000 square feet. Despite the combined space, a small footprint was a must for their new sachet machine.

During his visit to PACK EXPO, Richards said he met with several OEMs to see their sachet machines in action, but it was Matrix that won him over.

“We are 33,000 square feet and growing fast, every square foot in my warehouse has to have a purpose,” he said. “I needed something that I could trust to do the job but has the footprint where I can put it in a specific area and not take up my entire production room. This was the one machine out of the entire show that I really felt served that purpose.”

Matrix (https://www.matrixpm.com/) is the North American master distributor for INVpack, the manufacturer of the MVA sachet machine. Adding a sachet machine would help Absolutely Natural fill packaging needs that more of his customers were requesting, including a client looking to fill types of body butters. The flexibility to run different types of skin care products has opened up new revenue streams for the company.

“I’ve run body butters, shampoos, conditioners, lotions, and body oils on our sachet machine,” Richards said. “The versatility of the machine is very important to me because I want to utilize it as much as I can for my customers. My customers are not looking to run 10 million units in the month. Their production runs are smaller. This machine was built for that middle-ground customer; it’s the perfect vehicle to service them properly.”

The compact INVpack MVA sachet machine forms, fills and seals four sided flat sachets for liquids, powders, granulates and pasty products. Its design provides several customer advantages, including an unwinder system with integrated auto-alignment, splicing table, film compensator, integrated coding system (laser, inkjet, TTO), adjustable vertical cutting blades, powerful horizontal sealer, and powder fillers assembled in a mobile platform for cleaning process. Output ranges from 70 sachets per minute for a one-lane operation to 350 per minute with five lanes. Widths range from 150 mm for a one-lane operation to 40 mm for five lanes. Lengths range from 40 mm to 160 mm.

“There’s a lot of pre-engineered things that they thought about ahead of time to where I don’t even have to manually change anything; changeovers are very easy on this machine,” Richards said. “The machine is unbelievably smart. If the sachet runs out of film, it instantly shuts off and flags what needs to be done. Making the change takes five minutes.

“Downtime is extremely limited and small. Nobody likes spending money not running something, and they do a very good job at that.”

On average the machine runs a couple times a week, but Richards expects that frequency will increase as more customers add sachets to the offering. After more than two years of operation, the machine and relationship with Matrix have proven to be a winning combination for Absolutely Natural.

“This sachet machine has opened up new business segment opportunities for us that we always wanted to be in but didn’t quite have the right equipment,” Richards said. “Our relationship with Matrix and Shawn Varela, Matrix Regional Sales Manager, really helped provide the level of comfort we needed to make this purchase. I knew if I had a problem, not only would I have service behind me, but Shawn was behind me as well.

“Our sachet machine has proven to be an added value to our business portfolio.”

Watch the Full Case Study Video:

Absolutely Natural and Matrix Packaging Partner Together to Solve Packaging Dilemma!

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Inside Matrix Packaging: A Discussion with Jason Beard Company Culture – {Video Transcript}

June 21, 2023

Matrix has been working hard since 1988 to provide industries worldwide with vertical form fill seal machines, made right here in the USA. The company also provides rotary pre-made pouch bagging equipment and stickpack and sachet form fill seal machines. In addition to high quality machinery, Matrix prides itself on helping companies in the manufacturing process.

Matrix is dedicated to helping customers each step of the way, including:

Choosing the right packaging machine for your application
Installation
Set up & Working the Innovative Machine

{Video Transcript}

Matrix Culture

The culture of Matrix is really what attracted me to come to the company. It’s a customer first organization so when we start talking about what separates Matrix, it really is the culture and the way that we partner with our customers and that really starts at the front end where you take a consultative approach to specifying your piece of equipment and that travels right through project management and into our ongoing service and support.

The Value of Matrix

The value of Matrix as an organization is there’s a lot of equipment manufacturers in the world and my advice to anybody that’s looking to buy a piece of packaging equipment, make sure you understand who you’re partnering with because this equipment lasts for a long time and you need to make sure the longevity of your partner is going to be there so you have the service and support to really be productive and maximize your packaging efficiencies.

Who is Matrix?

Matrix provides flexible packaging machinery solutions to customers worldwide. Vertical form, fill, seal; pre-made pouches; stickpacks and sachets, and large pouch formats. Matrix can help you find your flexible packaging solution.

Matrix is committed to providing our customers with superior vertical form fill seal packaging solutions and to fully meeting your needs. To meet these objectives we provide one of the most complete customer service programs available in the industry including the service personnel, parts and training necessary to keep your equipment running at peak efficiency.

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OEMs Develop Compatible Solutions for Green Petfood Packaging

April 20, 2023

COLLABORATION AND COMPATIBLE MACHINERY PAVE THE WAY FOR SUSTAINABLE PACKAGING

By Troy Snader, Sr. Vice President of Business Development, ProMach’s Secondary Packaging Group

The 2022 PetFood Forum tech talk “Compostable/Recyclable Materials and Machinery Compatibility – Choices and Options,” by Troy Snader, Senior Vice President of Business Development for ProMach’s Secondary Packaging Group.

Walk through any pet store and you will see just how popular organic dog and cat food has become. According to petkeen.com, a staggering $22.8 billion was spent on organic pet food in 2020 – a figure that is expected to increase more than 10% by 2026.

As pet owners are embracing greener, healthier meals for their pets, they are also looking for a similar level of greenness in their food’s packaging. During a tech talk at the 2022 Petfood Forum, participants asked important questions about choices and options to improve the compatibility of form, fill and seal machinery with compostable and recyclable petfood packaging materials:

How would you characterize the state of petfood packaging today?

It is no surprise that consumers are behind the drive for sustainable petfood packaging. People today are looking for healthier, holistic options for their pets, and they are willing to pay more for petfood that contains better ingredients. While there are numerous green and holistic choices when it comes to petfood, there is a substantial push underway to extend green attributes to petfood packaging as well. The key in responding to these market needs is to provide the industry with machinery and packaging materials that meet the sustainability standards petfood manufacturers and consumers are looking for.

How are packaging OEMs responding to this call for sustainable petfood packaging?

Most of the recycled materials we use today are comprised of oriented polyethylene or polypropylene thermoplastic polymers. These two types of materials are mono layer, which are comprised of a single main material. In contrast, many common flexible packaging styles on the market today use laminated films, such as metallic or metalized films like aluminum. These differences in films have posed a challenge to packaging machines in the past, but most current designs in vertical and horizontal form fill seal machines are allowing pet food manufacturers to run these films using existing heat-sealing mechanisms, bars, cartridges, thermal couples, and other components.

What needs to be considered when running recycled or compostable materials?

While strong advances have been made, running recycled or compostable materials at high speeds on vertical and horizontal form fill seal machines can still be difficult, and remains a work in progress for some manufacturers. For example, oriented polyethylene has narrow (and lower) temperature sealing parameters compared to laminated film. What this means is that the optimal temperature window needed to create the seal on polyethylene film is limited, which slows production. By contrast, there is a 40-to-50-degree window to create the seals when running laminates – and a larger available window means faster production.

Why are stretch properties an important consideration for packaging films?

Recycled and compostable films also possess high stretch properties, and this is an important consideration if a customer is trying to run a registered bag. Typically, a registered bag has a 1-to-2-millimeter (plus or minus) cutoff. However, with these types of films, the customer is going to see a cutoff of 5-to-6 millimeters (plus or minus). That is a huge difference a lot of retailers won’t accept; frankly, that’s also out of range of what we would consider acceptable.

These are just a few of the factors that need to be considered and evaluated when running recycled or compostable films on packaging machinery. It is important for OEMs to work closely with material suppliers to innovate and develop practical solutions for more sustainable packaging.

What are some solutions for running green films on vertical form fill seal machinery?

We have developed several jaw-face styles that allow vertical form fill seal machines to seamlessly run a variety of film types, like green films. These machines are designed with a smooth HMI interface that allows for the operator to customize sealing for each film type. For example, the operator can dial in the specific heat temperature and length of sealing time, resulting in the perfect seal.

We also developed a pre-made pouch machine that employs several heating and cooling stations. This design innovation allows polyethylene and polypropylene films, which seal at a lower temperature, to be heated up slowly without burning and giving it a nice gradual heat transfer. This design also gives users more time on the machine to maintain their speed. In other words, instead of using one heat seal bar, the machine uses two heat seal bars to maintain its speed integrity.

Why is cooling a factor that needs to be considered when running green films?

Mono-layer films tend to wrinkle on side edges or at the top seal. Adding cooling can help alleviate some of those seal wrinkles to the point where the petfood package is acceptable to retailers and their customers. Many packaging OEMs offer a cooling station which is important when running green films. Machines with integrated cooling stations can produce a largely wrinkle-free bag. Adding multiple heat stations, along with cooling are just two ways to help effectively run a variety of recycled and compostable films on vertical form fill seal machines.

What needs to be considered when purchasing petfood packaging machinery?

Green films in petfood packaging are constantly evolving. Market demands and customer buying preferences today may very well be different five years from now. The best way to stay ahead of those trends is having packaging machinery that is flexible to run a wide variety of films. It’s important to work with a reputable OEM. Reputable OEMs are paving the way forward for greener packaging by working closely with film suppliers to deliver the best practical solutions to petfood manufacturers and their customers.

About the Author

Troy Snader is the Senior Vice President of Business Development for ProMach’s Secondary Packaging Group. He can be contacted at Troy.Snader@ProMachBuilt.com. For more information about ProMach please visit www.ProMachBuilt.com.

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Plan to visit ProMach brand booths at the 2023 Petfood Forum May 1st – 3rd in Kansas City.

Ossid provides superior tray overwrapping, flow wrapping, weigh price labeling, case scales, and horizontal thermoform fill & seal machinery. We are committed to designing and building solutions that protect product quality and fully meet our customers’ production needs.