After several successful forays into the wine-in-PET market (see also Plasteurope.com of 12.05.2011), Australian packaging giant Amcor’s (Abbotsford; www.amcor.com) Rigid Plastics division has developed a new 24 oz (680 gr) wide mouth food container made entirely of PET. The 63mm round container, which weighs just 51 gr, can be filled with products at temperatures of up to 96 °C, making it an ideal glass replacement for containers filled with pasta sauces, apple sauce, salsas, jams and jellies, Amcor says.

Highlighting the new container’s benefits, Amcor principal engineer Ron McFarlane said that “Amcor has taken wide mouth, hot fill containers to a new level by combining our round wall design and novel blow-trim technology to create a glass-like PET container that has all the desirable consumer advantages.” Using PET as opposed to glass not only guarantees weight savings, which in turn mean lower transportation costs, the plastics alternative does not break easily either, which means both brand owners and packagers can guarantee better inline production and handling.

Thanks to the Australian group’s Performance Widemouth (PWM) technology, the new container has a panel-less design and its four horizontal rubs and stuff walls resist the vacuum as the contents cools. Amcor said the jars are also available with oxygen barriers.