By Marilyn Gerlach

Australian packaging specialist Amcor (Hawthorn; www.amcor.com) said it has opened its European Innovation Center, a Belgium-based facility that will partner with brands and retailers from across the region to design packaging from concept to shelf.

In addition to existing centres in the US, South America, and Asia-Pacific, the Amcor Innovation Center Europe (AICE) in Ghent, Belgium, seeks to pioneer new material technologies to make packaging more sustainable and performant, while focusing on designs that stand out in shops and increase ease-of-use for consumers.

Michael Zacka, president Amcor Flexibles Europe, Middle East, and Africa, said the centre will offer customers “a complete brand solution, from concept to commercial launch”.

The Innovation Center Europe supports brands from concept to shelf using its Catalyst approach. This flexible, collaborative, and creative co-development methodology creates packaging solutions that take into account a brand’s market, consumer needs, sustainability and recyclability requirements, and customers’ existing production lines.

The AICE has a range of activities including the Material Science Center, which creates innovative packaging materials that can decrease packaging’s carbon footprint and support developments in high-barrier paper packaging and vapour-deposited nanocoating.

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It also features a Customer Engagement Center that boasts an observation room for consumer focus groups. Here, packaging appeal and usability can be tested in an on-site retail simulation area, plus kitchen, living room, and bathroom settings where consumers and markets alike can interact with packaging. The on-site prototyping lab can quickly create different packaging solutions for test participants to try out, the company said.

An e-commerce lab in the facility can test and certify packaging according to ISTA 6 standard as well as validate packaging for shipment through Amazon and other ecommerce distribution chains.

Amcor said the soon-to-be-added packaging and recycling test centre will house small-scale packing lines that mimic brands’ own packing lines for in-house machine trials. Recycling equipment will allow the company to evaluate packaging for ease of recyclability in the real world.