Starpack’s golden anniversary

The Starpack awards celebrated its 50th anniversary with a gala dinner and award ceremony at the Birmingham NEC, during the PPMA Show 2009. There were 64 winners of Gold, Silver and Bronze Stars, plus commended certificates, from some 200 entries across 16 categories.

The event, organised by The Packaging Society, accentuated how far the sector has come in tackling the requirement of climate change and consumer convenience. The judges were pleased by the ability of many entrants to avoid the trap of producing ‘clever packs’ just for the sake of it.

A ‘beautiful and technically outstanding’ bottle for Bloom, an up-market aromatic gin from Greenall, took a Gold Star in the Luxury Product Category and the Designer of the Year Award for design house Drinks Works and bottle manufacturer Allied Glass Containers.

Two Gold Stars - Brand Design and Household Design - went to StudioDavis for its stylish Ariel Excel Gel structural pack, designed with the Procter & Gamble WE Design Team. The judges enthused: “Packaging doesn’t get any better than this.” A polypropylene dosing cap can be removed from the body of the pack.

Simplicity was the key to the Gold Star winner in the Food Design category. Won by Pure Equator for its new range of kids organic and Fairtrade chocolate - My World Chocolate Buttons - the paper based pack features illustrations from artist Lucy Loveheart. The recycled paperboard packaging is produced by New Vision Packaging.

In the Drinks Design category, sponsored by Packaging Today, the Jack Daniels perforated tin won the judges’ approbation, taking a Gold Award. Manufactured by Crown Speciality Packaging, the ‘technically excellent design‘ features a new perforation process giving the consumer a glimpse of the bottle inside. The part vertical perforation of the body side-wall features 9,000 perforations running from top to bottom.

What was described as ‘a lovely piece of structural and graphic packaging design’ won both the Sponsor Award and Gold Star in overall sponsor WRAP’s Environmental Developments Category. To meet Green and Black’s directive to produce ‘a plastics-free Easter’, Chesapeake and design house Pearlfisher came up with a bag shaped carton which eliminated the need for a plastics fitment to hold each egg in place. The design also provides a 60% packaging weight reduction.

Sponsor Award winner and the Gold Star in WRAP’s Environmental Optimisation category went to an easy-open transit/retail display pack for Mars Chocolate from DS Smith Packaging which, said the judges, ‘goes some way to negating charges that RRP is intrinsically over-packaging’.

Clever developments

Saica Pack took Best in Show plus a Gold Star in the Retail Ready Display and Collation category with its clever development for International Greetings. Praised for its high integrity, strength and excellent point-of-sale credentials, the cost effective cell-like corrugated board format for wrapping paper provides an easy to assemble unit with generic internal components that slot together to form compartments.

In the Business to Consumer category, sponsored by Alcan Packaging, inspirepac won the Gold Star for a multi-functional pack that demonstrated excellent ergonomics and precision engineering. Developed for bicycle parts, the cleverly constructed single-piece concept is made from recyclable board, and features generic integral fitting that can be used for 41 different products, greatly reducing stock holdings.

In the Business to Business category, Gold went to DS Smith Packaging Tri-Wall for a heavy duty system for Land Rover Engine Parts. Designed to protect a heavy yet delicate product, using minimal material, the key requirements were to improve environmental sustainability, while reducing packaging costs and maximising the cube efficiency within the shipping container.

New for 2009, the PPMA sponsored Machinery Award of Excellence wasdesigned to ‘square the circle’ in Starpack’s representation of all packaging disciplines. The Gold Star went to Kliklok International for its Celox endload cartoner, whose modular design allows custom configuration and ease of integration in plant layouts. It is now being used by a number of major food manufacturers including United Biscuits, Findus and Kerry Foods.

This year’s Silver Star winners included Impress Metal Packaging for the UK’s first use of embossed print on black lids in the paint market; Saica Pack for a home delivery pizza box that includes a printed circular dot that changes colour to indicate that the pizza is hot; Crown Speciality Packaging’s ‘The Collection Egg’ tin whose environmental credentials include WRAP targets and the new PAS 2050 conditions promoted by the Carbon Trust; and Alcan Packaging Singen’s Tpod perforated stickpack concept for a range of premium teas.