Product packaging beside protecting your goods from damages is also a powerful driver of purchasing behaviour. Did you know that four in five people have tried a new product just because they liked its packaging, and 1 in 2 have switched brands because they liked the new brand’s packaging better? The way your product is packaged plays a remarkably key role in how consumers respond to it. Superior packaging can boost your brand, justify a high price point, and serve as a key difference between yourself and your competitors, and that’s just a part of what a good packaging can do. It is true that what’s inside the packaging counts more, but it’s amazing what good packaging can do for your product.
But unfortunately, a late 2016 survey of 2,000 online shoppers found that one in ten have received damaged items.
If you’re designing the packaging for a new product or a rebranding, you probably want to know how safe your goods will be and how customers will react to your packaging before you invest in a final design. With packaging testing, you can both satisfy consumer sentiment and choose the right packaging design for your product from the safety point of view.
Multiple elements can impact the condition of your packaging and the products inside. Everything from packaging materials used, to regulations in your market of sale and even the environmental conditions throughout your entire supply chain can obstruct your ability to deliver a quality product to your customers.
The following tests are typically performed for packaging of equipment such as consumer, or commercial electronics, toys, robotics, and mechanical items:
Pre-Conditioning, and/or aging
Temperature, humidity, and pressure
Vibration – sinusoidal and/or random
Shock Testing
Drop Testing
Compression Testing
Impact Testing
Transport through multiple vehicles, including trucks and vessels, produces vibration that can affect a shipping carton, its interior packaging, packaging closure and the products inside. And your packages might be subjected to additional bumping, shocks and vibration especially when traveling in less developed countries with unpaved roads.
The vibration and shock tests are meant to assess the performance of a package, including the interior packing and closure, in terms of its strength and the protection it provides the products within.
Many manufacturers struggle with the development of a packaging system design qualification test plan for compliance to regulatory standards.
To test that the product package is capable of withstanding the transportation and distribution environment, need to perform a package performance test protocol consisting of a series of laboratory tests that simulate the dynamic and environmental hazards associated with the distribution of products to their end use.
Distribution simulation testing is a uniform and repeatable way of evaluating packaging systems by utilizing laboratory equipment to subject the packaging system to specific hazards that may occur within the anticipated distribution environment. The primary goal is to have an effective shipping configuration that protects the product and package integrity during transit, and ultimately comply with regulatory standards.
One challenge many manufacturers have is to determine which procedure to specify for performance testing and compliance purposes, because the test method used must be recognized as a consensus standard and the test intensity of the procedure simulating the environment in which the packages will be transported must be realistic. There are several distribution simulation test methods that can be used for package performance testing. The ISO standard recommends the use of the ASTM and ISTA standards for simulating these hazards in the laboratory.
One of the standards used is: ASTM D999-08 (2015) that require a vibration table or a shaker and is suitable for packaging materials: containers of any form, material, kind or design of interior packing, means of closure and any size and weight. Containers are generally tested once loaded, rather than unloaded, to measure the strength of the interior packaging and closure.
Shock Testing for packaging
A shock test might seem similar to the drop test, a free-fall drop test that is easy to perform during a pre-shipment inspection and that can reveal issues in packaging materials, methods or assortment through a series of drops. But for a more comprehensive and statistically accurate packaging testing you need to consider a shock test performed in a laboratory.
With an on-site drop test done during a pre-shipment inspection, the orientation of each drop is manually determined by the inspector. Whereas there are standards for how to orient the carton for a series of nine drops, manual packaging testing still cannot provide statistical accuracy of an exactly perpendicular drop with the dropping surface. A shock system can determine an exact 90 degree drop from the corner of the shipping carton and the dropping surface, while a human might drop the carton at a 92 or 95 degree drop.
How much difference does a few degrees really make you will ask? Well, ASTM testing found a variation of as little as two degrees from perpendicularity resulted in an 8% lower acceleration and dispersal of impact energy. So a less precise on-site carton drop test alone may be inadequate in revealing important vulnerabilities in your packaging and consequently damaging your products.
One of the standards to use for shock testing is ASTM D 5487 that requires a shock testing machine and is suitable for packaging materials: loaded shipping containers, cylindrical containers, and bags and sacks.
3 important tips to consider before making any decisions on your distribution simulation testing:
As we have seen, the test method used is very important so work with your packaging testing lab to understand the specific test procedure that need to use to evaluate your shipping configuration for validation and to make sure you’re using a test procedure that is going to best simulate your distribution environment.
The environment in which the packages will be transported must be realistic so perform a feasibility testing prior to executing a full blown performance test.
Provide adequate time to perform a thorough validation of the tests performed.
Don’t disregard the importance of packaging testing in a qualified laboratory. Poor quality packaging puts your product quality at risk if it fails to adequately protect your product from unsuitable environments, water damage or rough handling.
Verifying packaging quality through both pre-shipment inspection and laboratory testing ensures your products will arrive on your customer’s doorstep undamaged and in perfect condition.
Our ISO17025 accredited testing and calibration laboratory perform shock testing to prepare products and packaging for harsh industrial, transportation and military environments.
