Packaging Choice

We have been missing for a few days, but that doesn’t mean that we’ve not been working and thinking in our project and new content for our Blog.

This post is intended to give you some context about the development of the packaging’s creation process.

The pollution is becoming a serious preoccupation as the years go by, since it not only affects us humans, but also every living creature and every ecosystem of the planet. The change is crucial and, because of that, our team compromises to create a more sustainable packaging that guarantees all the safety and conservation conditions necessary to store the food.

This is without a doubt a difficult task.

The first step was deciding which material we should use for the constitution of the packaging. After analysing our options, brainstorming as a team and discussing the pros and cons of our ideas, we opted to choose the mango stone as our primary source of material of our packaging.

Of course, this idea has its pros and cons, such as:

Pros	Cons
Make use of the not used parts of the mango.	Not every mango stone has the same characteristics needed for its production.
It’s a biodegradable plastic, soluble in water.	It depends on the season and the place of origin of the mango.
Low CO2 emission.	Natural biopolymers are more expensive.
In average, the compound dissolves in 2 months.	The shell and the stone vary in composition and structure between the same species, depending also on the season and the place of origin.

With all of this in mind, we are aware that this material has its limitations, that later on might become greater challenges, but we also believe that it has a huge potential and that it also is a very original and creative idea. As a team, we will give our best to make this project come true!

Chosen material: we were then faced with the decision of choosing which material our packaging would be made. The initial idea was to create a mango juice packaging produced with the mango stone’s fibre. That idea was later discarded, because for it to be achievable it would be necessary to impermeabilize the packaging, which would turn it less sustainable.

Therefore, we thought on choosing a substance that was not liquid nor humid and we came to a conclusion that dried fruits were the best option!

To make sure we don’t unravel everything all at once, we will talk about the process of deciding the format and aesthetic of the packaging in another post, where you will be able to read and see the prototypes in 3D.

Stay tuned for further news!!

Team E-Thinking