Bogar AG (Wallisellen, Switzerland) produces a full line of products for dogs, cats, and horses. Often employing natural ingredients like plant extracts for its formulas, Bogar requires packaging that can preserve its contents. One such product is Bogacare Zeckenmittel Margosa Spot-on, which is made of Margosa extract and registered as a biocide for repelling ticks, mites, and fleas from dogs and cats for about 2–4 weeks after each application.
In March 2007, Bogar chose unit-dose tubes from Neopac AG (Switzerland) to package the spot-on treatment. The product had to be filled in a unit- dose package with capacity of 0.75 ml (for cats) and 1.5 and 2.5 ml (for dogs).

Bogar needed a practical means of product application as well as product protection and quality. Pet owners and caregivers needed to be able to hold either a cat or dog with one hand and apply the product to the target areas with ease and precision. Packages also needed to be easy to open with just one hand. Barrier properties were also critical because essential oils could not be allowed to penetrate and damage of the tube.

Neopac offers a range of different tubes and closures, offering a range of designs for new application systems. Neopac was able to offer a unit-dose Polyfoil tube, which provided the high-barrier properties needed to preserve the product’s essential oils.

A long and softly rounded nozzle, which Neopac originally created for a rectal application, was added to the tube to ease fur application. The pet holder applies two spots into the fur (neck and lower back). The biggest functional challenge was ensuring that the nozzle remained softly rounded after opening. The opening pin was designed to be well hidden, so when broken, the nozzle does not scratch during product application. Neopac also needed to ensure that the unit-dose tubes, with their long nozzles, could be filled on a normal filling machine. Neopac’s tubes are delivered to customers with every tube head and closure already mounted. The customer bottom-fills the tube and welds the end of it shut with a hot air-machine. Since the nozzle is so long, it has little space to be properly fixed in a tube-filling-machine. Also, the weight of the filling makes it difficult for the tube to be balanced for the final step, welding. Neopac worked with Bogar to ensure trouble-free filling.