Packaging with Scents

Who has not secretly done this once in their life? Unscrewed a jar of hand cream or tube of shower gel to make their purchasing decision based on the scent? Until now this has often proved expensive for product manufacturers: products with opened packaging can no longer be sold. Producers have been working on solutions for some time now to retain this tamper evidence while allowing the aroma to unfold nevertheless. Innovative technologies open up new opportunities for those with inquisitive noses.

You have to like your partner’s scent – this applies not only to human relations but also to relations between consumers and their body care products, food and the like. The global market for scented packaging has grown by 15% annually over the past 15 years – scent technology is up and coming. Aromas are already spread in every conceivable area of life – even in public waiting rooms or to support children with learning impairments. On top of this, the innovative approaches for releasing fragrances from packaging in a targeted manner save time, money and material.  

“Squeeze & Sniff”! Through a unique composition of fragrance pearls consumers can test the scent of “Lenor Unstoppables” at the POS without having to open the packaging. As soon as the detachable cap is squeezed the fragrance escapes through tiny openings. In addition to this direct fragrance experience Lenor’s proprietary freshness depot technology ensures the aroma encapsulated in bubbles is only released when the washed garments are touched. Thus the fragrance is said to last until three months in users’ wardrobe.  

Tekni-Plex from the US state of Pennsylvania has also achieved a breakthrough with its Sniff Seal Liner Technology. This global packaging player has chiefly risen to the challenges of innovative materials here. Now filed, the patent is the first of its kind allowing aromas to be smelled through induction-sealed closures. By company accounts, the process can be used for a wide variety of materials and is suitable for single-ply materials or up to nine-layer laminations.  

Thanks to a development by packaging specialist Follmann especially exquisite packaging embossing can also release the perfume 1:1 once the correspondingly varnished area of the box is simply touched. By using an additional sleeve the oil-based Folco-Scent varnishes can be encapsulated and hermetically conserved in microscopically small spheres. The special incorporation of the fragrance capsules prevents the spheres from bursting during the printing. However, when touched by consumers they open and are said to be able to retain their full effect up to twelve months despite outside influences.

Finally, packaging expert Edelmann has also taken a closer look at olfactory perception. The result here are also microscopic capsules whose liquid, not water-soluble content is released by scratching or squeezing. They are hermetically sealed, conserved and admixed to the varnish printed onto folding boxes.