When Do You Need A Contract Packager?

Not sure if you need a contract packager? Can’t decide if your packaging project is too big or too small to outsource? Here are some tips to help you decide.

Do You Need a Contract Packager?

You should talk to a contract packager when…

  • Your packaging volume under or over employs your own packaging lines, either short or long term.
  • There’s a specific, short-term requirement that may be better served by specific packaging experience or equipment you don’t have.
  • There’s a short run for a new product test, gift pack and so forth which may otherwise require the investment in new equipment.
  • Promoting your product with increasingly popular marketing weapons of nonstandard packaging or promotional inserts requires special machinery or labor intensive work.
  • The pressure of new business or deadlines creates a heavy, short-term workload for which you require experienced help to supplement the efforts of in-house staff.
  • A product may more economically be shipped in bulk to a distant market, then unit packed locally.
  • New packaging forms unfamiliar to your staff and equipment may be specified.
  • There is no available in-house equipment or expertise for a particular job.
  • The plant is closing for maintenance or faced with a labor availability problem.
  • There’s a warehouse full of a product that needs reworking to make it salable.
  • A new package form is to be market tested before general introduction.
  • The company is faced with a high investment to meet regulatory and environmental compliance.

However, there may be times when it may be premature to talk to a contract packager. For example, when…

  • The need is unclear or at least not clearly stated.
  • The problem can be more effectively and efficiently addressed using other methods.
  • You think the contract packager can salvage a project that you suspect is no longer salvageable.
  • The company is not organizationally or financially prepared to implement the contract packager’s suggestions.