Field-To-Lab®

Optimizing the Product/Package System For Cost Reduction and Quality Improvement.

The perfect package system is one that would deliver a product in pristine condition with no additional packaging costs. That perfect package would consist of a product rugged enough by its own design to withstand the hazards of the distribution environment. No additional packaging materials, no additional costs, yet a damage free product. Since the real world stops short of perfection, Field-to-Lab® Solutions provides a comprehensive service for optimizing the product/package equation

The basic function of protective packaging is to provide a buffer between the product and the hazards of the distribution environment. Field-to-Lab® Solutions begins with the Field Data Recorder instrumentation.  Measurements are made to record the specific hazards that your products will encounter during handling and transportation in their actual distribution network. This involves the characterization of the actual distribution environment with the measurement of shocks, drops, vibrations, temperatures, humidity and other dynamic and atmospheric conditions that pose potentially damaging hazards for your goods in transit.

Once the potentially damaging hazards of the distribution environment have been identified, Field-to-Lab® Solutions enables the determination of the unpackaged product's ability to withstand these dynamic inputs by seamlessly replicating the distribution environment on test systems in a laboratory environment.

Based on this analytical foundation, application of the Six Step Method for Product/Package Development enables the package designer to proceed with the development of an optimized product/package system resulting in continuing cost and quality benefits.

Ideally, the package will provide enough protection to exactly match the protective needs of the product in distribution environment, resulting in an economical, effective product/package system. There are, however, two pitfalls that may occur without the benefit of Field-to-Lab® Solutions. In the first situation, the package falls sort of the protection requirements and a significant amount of damage occurs during shipment. This "under-packaging" is fairly obvious to detect, but is avoidable and easily corrected with changes to the method of shipment, package design, product design or combinations of each. In the second situation little or no damage occurs, but the product is "over-packaged". In effect, the package is providing more protection than is required. Just as "under-packaging" wastes money through damaged product and loss of customer good will, "over-packaging" siphons money directly from a company's bottom line.

Visualize the product/package "system" depicted in the bar chart. Bar #1 can be thought of as the hazards of the distribution environment, actually quantified with Field-to-Lab® Solutions. The product generally has some inherent ability to withstand this environment, however it usually is not rugged enough to make it through shipment on its own. The role of the package is to make up the difference between the hazards of the distribution environment and what the product can withstand on its own. The ideal case would be as depicted in Bar #2 where the product is inherently rugged and able to withstand the environment. Bar # 3 depicts a package that exactly makes up the difference between the product's ruggedness and the environmental hazards. If the package falls short as depicted in Bar #4, "under-packaging" has occurred and damage in shipment will most likely result. If the package provides too much protection as depicted in Bar #5, "over-packaging" has occurred and money is being wasted on protection that is not required. Ironically, ineffective, "over-packaging" can also contribute to damaged product. In certain instances it will actually be less expensive to ruggedize the product as depicted in Bar #6, rather than put an expensive package around each unit.

Field-to-Lab® Solutions provides the technical tools to enable the precise, confident optimization of the product/package system equation.