Earlier this month Spectra exhibited for their ninth consecutive appearance at Packaging Innovations at the Birmingham NEC.

Despite adverse weather conditions, which made making travelling difficult, significant numbers of visitors braved the snow to visit the prestigious two-day packaging event, which saw over 300 industry leading suppliers as well as major name speakers.

At this year’s show Sustainability was top of the agenda following calls from Government, media and consumers for packaging to be more recyclable and renewable.

Spectra used this opportunity to hightlight a number of environmental initiatives which drew heavy visitor interest to their brand new show stand.

Amongst the initiatives on show was the unveiling of PCR10, a new opt-out directive that will see a minimum of 10% recycled materials added to all future HDPE and PET products by the end of this year.

Sales Director Jonathan Powell, who was was one of the Spectra team at the show said, “This year we created a dedicated display highlighting our environmental endeavours and were delighted with the positive response it received. Our new PCR10 certainly captured the imagination of visitors and showed our intent in taking the initiative to customers instead of putting the onus on them”.

Other popular displays on Spectra’s stand were the company’s sugarcane-based biopolymer products and a number of internal environmental measures including the reduction of single-use items at Spectra, the company's energy efficiency initiative and the use of post-industrial recycled materials for using in future manufacturing to minimise landfill waste.

Jonathan went on to say, “The sustainable focus of our stand worked on a number of levels. Firstly it helped illustrate how serious we take sustainability as a responsible manufacturer and also showed that there are alternative materials such as PCR and Biopolymer available to customers wishing to make an environmental difference”.

He added, “Encouragingly, it also helped open a dialogue with visitors about the boundless benefits and opportunities of plastics when used responsibly”.

The show featured a number of presentations and seminars with an environmental theme. For example, the Big Plastics Debate, featuring experts from Iceland, Coca-Cola European Partners, Co-op, ASDA, and Marks & Spencers focussed on two key areas, ‘the road ahead for packaging professionals’ and ‘developing new approaches to plastics’.

New designs for 2018

As well as highlighting the company’s environmental directives, Spectra also premiered a range of new designs which drew keen interest from visitors to their stand.

As with previous shows, the new range of pack prototypes, all conceived by Spectra's in-house design department, illustrated the company’s commitment to innovation with radical and groundbreaking packaging solutions aimed at inspiring customers to push the boundaries with their product packaging.

Jonathan commented, “We have been premiering new pack concepts for a number of years and visitors are always interested in seeing what we come up with next. In highly competitive sectors such as the personal care and cosmetics markets, it is vital to provide innovative ways for brands to stay one step ahead of the competition”.

Spectra’s next show appearance will be at Cosmetics Business in Munich Germany in June. This will be followed by another showing at Packaging Innovations London Olympia in September.