Aplix Easy-Lock wins Kellogg’s deal
The product comes with self-mating micro hooks for flexible bags and is easier for people to open and maintains the freshness of a pack for longer.
Move away from Bag-in-Box
Caine Folkes-Miller, business development director, Aplix Group, told FoodProductionDaily it won the deal in 2012 but it took two years to develop to get the machines built, conduct market research trials and carry out audits.
“It took a few years of hard work to get the design accepted on the market so to have that much success in such a short space of time and have it pay off has been really rewarding,” he said.
Folkes-Miller said he met with a Kellogg’s packaging technologist in Chicago in 2010 and they expressed an interest the technology but they didn’t have any relevant projects at the time because everything was bag-in-box but they wanted to move away from that.
“We first went to market with it in the US in 2011, we believe we have had a lot of success with it because people are moving away from traditional zip pack products,” he added.
“A press to close zip is fiddly to use, especially for an older demographic who will play a larger part in the consumer group moving forward. It’s an intuitive product like playing with bubble wrap.
“It was incredibly exciting to see for the first time the product advertised on TV promoting Kellogg’s cereal. We have more plans for the crunchy nut granola range and will be rolling that out in due course.”
My M&M's
The company also recently won a deal to launch My M&M's – a special edition pack of red and white M&M's and Anchor cheddar cheese by Arla.
The design has won several awards including the French prize for innovation at Packinnov in 2010 and its Californian client Mariani won the innovative product award at the International Nut & Dried Fruit Conference in 2011.
“Traditionally our company began in the aerospace and hygiene market, as Velcro France - the journey from aircraft products to flexible packaging has been an exciting one, a departure from our core business which took a lot of faith and commitment from senior managers and the sales force alike, ” said Folkes-Miller.
“It has been very rewarding to see our product being used and trusted by major global brands and we are now looking to branch out into baby food packs and we are running trials with a major chocolate manufacturer on some chocolate sweets which will be launched in 2015.
“The product is being trialled in Australia which is a useful place to test products because it is such a small market and M&M's launched a pack with our product last month.
“Next is a launch with Asda for its own-brand cheese packs and Interpack where we will exhibit our existing products in Dusseldorf, Germany from May 8-14.”
Aplix hopes to redevelop its product towards the end of 2014 working on increasing its ease of use, closability and its scensory aspect – making it more ‘clicky’ and ‘poppy’.
