Insignia Technologies has unveiled its new automatic ‘After Opening Timer’ label that can help consumers reduce food waste by showing how long a packet of food has been open.
Insignia’s ‘smart ink’ technology has been developed as an extension of its original smart label product, and aims to provide consumers with a visual indication of a product’s freshness to prevent food from being thrown away unnecessarily.
Insignia’s After Opening Timer is intended for foods packaged within a modified atmosphere, such as cooked meats and cheeses. Food packaging manufacturers can print its smart ink into the lidding film of the packaging and, once opened, the ink changes colour over time to indicate how long the pack has been opened for.
The printed indicator can be calibrated to the recommended timescales of each food packaging manufacturer. It is also temperature sensitive, meaning the rate of colour change will decrease at a colder temperature as storing foods like cooked meats below certain temperatures can result in a longer open life.
Whilst existing guidelines for food consumption err on the side of caution, it is claimed that Insignia’s technology can provide greater accuracy on how fresh a product is and extend the length of time the consumer has to eat packaged food after opening it.
According to the Waste & Resources Action Plan (WRAP), around 10 million tonnes of food waste is generated every year in the UK, 70% of which was intended for consumption.
David Kilshaw, Founder and CEO at Insignia Technologies, said: “The amount of food that is wasted by consumers is staggering. Every day, 2.2 million slices of ham are thrown away in the UK, many of which will still be edible. Our ink technology can help to provide a solution.
“Our colour changing smart ink is a simple visual reminder that not only helps prevent people from throwing away food too quickly, but also brings peace of mind to consumers that their food is still safe to eat.”
Dr Graham Skinner, Product Development Manager at Insignia Technologies, added: “Traditionally our colour changing technology was printed as labels that needed to be applied to the inside of the lidding film. However, this created an additional step for food packaging manufacturers. As a result, we decided to develop our product further by creating smart ink that can be printed into the lidding film in the same way that other branding design is. This makes the process of packaging and manufacturing much simpler and easier.”
NAM Implications:
- This smart-ink labelling has to be a no-brainer.
- A pointer for retailers and suppliers…
