When Sonoco announced plans to acquire European metal packaging specialist Eviosys after nearly a decade A $4 billion deal This summer, the packaging giant made clear its intention to invest heavily in metal food cans.
When New materials and formats According to sources, canned food is becoming more widespread in the packaging sector, and food companies are increasing sales through innovation in some areas. Canned food is still attractive as it is a relatively stable market with steady growth.
Before the acquisition, Sonoco had annual revenue of $1 billion. Metal packaging In the United States, it includes aerosols for household products and cans for vegetables, tomatoes and beans. Sonoco estimates that the deal will expand the total addressable market for metal packaging to $25 billion worldwide.
Competitors like Crown Holdings, which focuses more on beverage cans Deleted Check out the growth potential of canned pet food protein.
A big reason packaging manufacturers are confident in metal food cans is because CPG customers have been sticking with the material for decades, and many in the packaging industry don’t see that changing.
While flexible pouches have caught the attention of some new food brands, many manufacturers are doubling down on cans. Canned foods offer consumers a more affordable option, and companies have the opportunity to market their products to sustainability-conscious consumers. Canned packaging advocates say it has the advantage of “infinite recyclability.”
“Consumers want to feel good about their environmental impact, and cans are a way for us to explore that,” said Robert Loggins, director of external affairs and community engagement for Busch Brothers, the Tennessee-based company that makes Busch’s beans. “It’s almost the perfect packaging.”
Bush's can suppliers include Sonoco and Crown. Bush has a long-standing relationship with Sonoco in particular, with its Tennessee plant located right next to Bush's production facility.
“Having those two companies has been really important and fundamental to our success,” Loggins said.
What is the function of the can?
Bush has been canning for over a century. canned food It dates back to 1795. Today, canned fruits and vegetables, soups and ready-to-eat meals are driving industry growth, says Chris Chopp, senior lab technologist in the Food Research and Development Division at NSF, an independent standards and certification organization.
Vegetables and tomatoes make up a large portion of Sonoco's canned product line, and the company is forecasting low-single-digit growth in that category and in the soup category as well.
Ajeeth Enjeti, general manager, European Foods, Trivium Packaging, said that as CPGs add new recipes or products, they also help drive demand for canned packaging.
“Demand for things like vegetables, soups, things people always buy, is going to remain stable,” said Camille Kortz, president and owner of Indigo Packaging and Consulting. “That’s what makes it a very stable packaging format.”
The long history of cans comes with a bit of a stigma. Some consumers remember the jagged cans of tuna or mashed vegetables stocked in their grandmother’s pantry. But recent events have changed that.
“During the pandemic, consumers viewed canned goods as a way to support their families without having to make frequent trips to the grocery store,” said Sherri Rosenblatt, who recently retired as chief strategy officer and vice president of marketing communications at Cannery Research.
Then, as inflation escalated, canned goods offered a cheaper alternative to fresh produce or seafood. While several groups said they had no data to share on specific market growth, there was an anecdotal sense that canned goods were doing well in an inflationary environment.
“Canning was a comfort to them,” Rosenblatt said. “This was an opportunity for the canned food industry to continue its momentum.”
Canned goods for sale at a Safeway store in San Angelo, California, on April 11, 2022, at a time when inflation was weighing on consumers.
Justin Sullivan via Getty Images
Companies have been banking on the convenience, safety, and cheapness of food and the fact that cans are recyclable. This has been a big selling point for CPGs and consumers. They have adjusted the cans to make them more appealing, such as adding pull tabs so that consumers can open the package without a can opener. BPA removed From can linings to lightweight cans.
“Consumers now expect sustainability to be integrated into packaging as well as the food itself,” NSF’s Chop said in an email.
Rosenblatt said the steel used in food cans is generally infinitely recyclable. According to Bush, the type of steel used in cans has the highest recyclability of all food packaging, at 58 percent.
Tony Perrotta, a sustainability and regenerative economy expert at PA Consulting, said aluminum, used in some food and beverage packaging, “occupies a really unique position in materials recovery.” Aluminum has high recovery rates and, aside from the energy required to produce and recycle the material, “is almost infinitely recyclable and reusable.”
Packaging companies are also focusing on balancing virgin and recycled aluminum in their products. “There’s a fight going on about all types of recycled content,” Perrotta said.
Recyclability is the reason. Metal cans from HeyDay Canning Company. HeyDay makes premium ready-to-eat canned beans targeting consumers ages 25 to 45. Today, a 15-ounce can sells for $4.50 to $5. When HeyDay launched four years ago, Kat Kavner said she and her co-founders debated whether to use flexible pouches or cans.
“We didn’t spend a lot of time on this decision,” Kavner said, because her research found that curbside recycling for stand-up pouches wasn’t widely available at HeyDay locations across the U.S., and cans were the most recycled type of food packaging.
“It was a natural choice. We had to go with cans,” she said. “There’s no way to justify releasing something in single-use plastic packaging when there are much better alternatives.”
In fact, according to Perrotta, the recovery and recycling rates for flexible pouches are “very low.” They’ve also faced pushback from consumers who feel they can’t get everything they’ve bought out.
“Here I am rolling the toothpaste and trying to squeeze out every last drop,” Perotta said.
Still, many new food brands are embracing flexible pouches as a way to express a modern identity. The packaging “signals to the consumer that this is something different and new, and not the same canned food,” Kavner said.
It's flexible
According to Trivium's Enjeti, the process of packaging food in cans or pouches is similar in that it requires high heat to produce a shelf-stable product, which means can suppliers are facing “more competition from plastics” in certain categories.
Soups, for example, fit well into flexible pouches with plastic screw caps, says Chism of Indigo Packaging.. The packaging is resealable and microwaveable.
The Flexible Packaging Association says this lightweight packaging could benefit shoppers. Source Reduction GoalFood manufacturers are also starting to consider more sustainable designs in pouches, such as single-material laminates, recycled films, and compostable films. Jorge Izquierdo, Vice President of Market Development at PMMI (Packaging and Processing Technology Association).
Three years ago, Bush acquired Good Bean Co., which uses flexible pouches to package beans. Loggins said the packaging has several advantages: It’s light, easy to ship, and consumers can microwave the food straight from the pouch.
“This acquisition will allow us to learn and research in real time about flexible pouches,” Loggins said.
But Bush has no plans to give up cans. CPG sees cans as a “core competency” and plans to stick with metal packaging in its product line, Loggins said. “We work closely with our partners, Sonoco and Crown, to ensure we’re putting the best product in the best container.”
