Munich: IFCO SYSTEMS, the world’s leading supplier of Reusable Plastic Containers (RPCs) for fresh food, today announces the launch of its new RPC Mini Series. The Mini Series RPCs are the smallest reusable containers on the market specifically designed for the transportation of fresh food. The size of the RPCs allows retailers, growers and suppliers to efficiently use the available space when transporting convenience food and fresh, pre-packed food for immediate consumption.
Increasing transportation volume by one third per pallet
With the development of the new RPC Mini Series IFCO is responding to changing customer needs. More and more consumers are buying healthy snacks prepared for immediate consumption, such as sandwiches, ready-to-eat salads, carrot sticks or apple slices. As retailers have adapted their product ranges to this demand, the need for reusable packaging in which convenience food and fresh snacks prepared for immediate consumption can be transported efficiently and, in a space-saving manner has been continuously increasing. Due to the special shape of these products, for example triangular packaging for sandwiches, a lot of unused space remains during transport in conventional returnable packaging.
The IFCO RPC Mini Series is designed to save space when transporting pre-packed, ready-to-eat snacks and convenience food. As a result, the transportation volume increases by one third per pallet compared to the use of conventional reusable containers. Mini Series RPCs are also suitable for the compelling presentation of fresh food and snacks in retail outlets and the products can be placed so that the label with all important product information is visible.
“With our RPC Mini Series, we offer our customers future-oriented reusable packaging. The consumption of convenience food and healthy snacks prepared for immediate consumption will continue to increase in the coming years. With our Mini Series RPC, which has been specially developed for the transport of these products, we enable our customers to make optimum use of the limited space available and deliver the goods fresh and cost-efficiently to their destination,” explains Wolfgang Orgeldinger, CEO at IFCO SYSTEMS.
RPC Mini Series allows more efficiency, sustainability and space gains
The RPC Mini Series offers the same quality as all other IFCO RPCs. The stable and well-ventilated reusable containers cool the transported food optimally, increasing the shelf life of the goods throughout the entire supply chain and reducing product damage by up to 96 percent compared to disposable packaging.
With the RPC Mini Series, IFCO now offers retailers, growers and suppliers the opportunity to transport convenience food and fresh food prepared for immediate consumption in a sustainable, space-saving and efficient manner. The RPCs are cleaned and disinfected according to the proven IFCO SmartCycleTM before being put back into circulation. IFCO repairs damaged RPCs, allowing them to be reused up to 100 times, and only granulates the RPCs when they are irreparably damaged. In this case, IFCO uses the granulate to produce new reusable plastic containers. As the use of IFCO RPCs protects natural resources and leads to significant decreases in CO2 emissions and solid waste, retailers, growers and suppliers can dramatically reduce their ecological footprint.
The Mini Series RPCs are a quarter of the size of conventional RPCs, and compatible with IFCO Green Plus RPCs. The first of the new reusable containers were launched in the UK in February. In the few months since then, the pool of IFCO’s Mini Series RPCs has already grown to 250,000 units.
About IFCO:
IFCO is the leading global provider of reusable packaging solutions for fresh foods, serving customers in 50+ countries. IFCO operates a pool of over 314 million Reusable Plastic Containers (RPCs) globally, which are used for over 1.7 billion shipments of fresh fruits and vegetables, meat, poultry, seafood, eggs, bread, and other items from suppliers to grocery retailers every year. IFCO RPCs ensure a better fresh food supply chain by protecting freshness and quality and lowering costs, food waste and environmental impact compared to single-use packaging. More: www.ifco.com.
