Nexeo Plastics offers a range of commodity and specialized thermoplastics resins for various packaging applications, including film, consumer packaged goods, cosmetics, medical, personal care, industrial, and more. Beyond logistics, we can support you wherever you are in your production cycle. From design to commercialization, our technical experts work closely with you to understand application requirements including regulatory, sustainability, process, and performance requirements.
We work closely with our suppliers to help ensure materials adhere to applicable regulatory and performance-based standards, including:
Whether it’s material specification, part design, troubleshooting or assistance during manufacturing tests, we can help tackle your packaging challenges. Our skilled Technical Support Representatives and Application Development Engineers (ADE) have specialized technical expertise in the rigid and flexible packaging market. Our TechConnect Center can help you understand material information, regulatory standards and discover material alternatives.
Thermoplastics find extensive use in the packaging industry due to their versatility. They are employed in various applications, including bottles, containers, films, and bags, commonly using materials like polyethylene, polypropylene, and PET. Thermoplastics are also essential for blister packaging, caps and closures, as well as protective packaging solutions such as bubble wrap and foam sheets.
Common plastics for packaging applications include Polyethylene (PE), Polypropylene (PP), Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET), Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC), and Polystyrene (PS). These plastics offer diverse properties suited to various packaging needs, from flexible bags and bottles to rigid containers and protective packaging materials. The choice of plastic depends on factors like product type, desired level of protection, and sustainability considerations.
Packaging plastics offer versatility in shape and size, lightweight properties for cost-effective transportation, and excellent barrier capabilities against moisture and gases. They are often transparent, customizable, and chemically resistant, making them suitable for various products. Some packaging plastics prioritize sustainability, and can incorporate safety features like tamper-evident seals for consumer protection.
Flexible packaging offers a significant advantage due to its wide range of manufacturing processes available. It can undergo blown film extrusion, cast extrusion, or calendering. These diverse methods enable the use of nearly any thermoplastic resin for creating flexible packaging.
The flexibility in resin choices enables flexible packaging to provide:
The multitude of manufacturing processes available for flexible packaging enables us to work with a variety of resins, with LDPE, LLDPE, HDPE, and, when a barrier is required, PA (polyamides), being among the most commonly used resins.
For flexible packaging, we offer thermoplastics for food, non-food, shrink, stretch and industrial markets. We also supply packaging resins for a variety of manufacturing processes, including injection molding grades for caps and closures, as well as flexible grades for biaxially-oriented polypropylene (BOPP) and biaxial-oriented polyamide (BOPA), blown, cast and film lamination applications, with various properties, including high clarity and extensibility.
The primary advantages lie in the ability to utilize various resins, with weight being the foremost consideration. Compared to our competitive materials, such as glass and steel, plastics are significantly lighter. This results in the capacity to transport less of your product in the same truck, container, or similar, since glass and steel are 20 to 25% heavier. Consequently, you can mitigate transportation weight limitations and reduce freight costs.
Furthermore, plastics offer enhanced durability, displaying higher impact resistance and greater tolerance to transportation handling. This translates to reduced breakage and minimized losses during transit.
For rigid packaging, we can deliver materials that meet stringent performance requirements, including FDA approved plastics for food contact and medical grade thermoplastic resins for melt strength, barrier, processability, dimensional stability, optics, impact resistance, tamper evidence, reseal ability, sustainability, and safety.
Nexeo Plastics is committed to reducing our environmental footprint and integrating sustainable practices across all areas of our operations. We are proud to offer various sustainable plastics, including biobased, compostable, and recycled, used in our packaging applications.