FDBusiness.com

In a recent interview for FoodProductionDaily.com, packaging company Benson Group speculated that the incorporation of sensors into packaging could lead to innovations that include self-sorting chocolates and ketchup bottles that allow consumers to squeeze the right amount of sauce onto their food.

Nikki Clark, Benson’s marketing manager, noted that electro-responsive polymers could be used in chocolate boxes, giving each piece of confectionery a sensor that consumers can touch to move the pieces around based on their preferences. The self-sorting of chocolate occurs before the consumer opens the package, Clark said.

Sensors can also be incorporated into the caps of ketchup bottles to prevent consumers from squeezing too much sauce. They would also allow consumers to choose from three different-sized squirts. This type of technology could extend to food labels, allowing them to always shift toward the consumer. An innovative label could also tell when a product is not facing the customer and automatically orients itself so the food item is facing in the right direction.

Moreover, electrophoretic technology for labels, such as that used for Kindle e-readers, could become more widespread soon, according to Benson.

Here at AIPIA we think that while self-sorting chocolates and self-orienting bottles may not be high on the list of either brand owner or consumer priorities, there is a future for such technologies, but more likely to be in orienting surgical instruments, portion-controlling drugs and directional video screens and other applications where cost of technology can be justified by application.