Stand up pouches have become the most widely used pouch format in the flexible packaging industry. The adoption rates for standup pouches have risen because of the steep increase and growth of modern trade in India. Modern trade stores now account for over 10% of the total FMCG market share compared to 2001, when the modern trade store market share was around 4%. One more number that I would like to point out is the growth of online e-commerce companies and their fair contribution to the growth of the FMCG industry. Online ecommerce sales of FMCG products now account for 3% of total sales in India. Compared to 2004, when the number was merely 0.35%, Most of which came from Big Basket, which was then the biggest online grocery company.
Coming to 2022 where every brand has now adopted the model of selling their brand online vs. retail in the general or modern trade. Every brand that instance works with today starts its first sale using online e-commerce platforms like amazon, big basket, jio mart, Flipkart, and, let’s not forget, Shopify. The widespread adoption rates of the internet in India and the acceptance of the idea that a consumer can now buy groceries online has supercharged the industry, and the main beneficiary of this hyper growth has been FMCG startups.
Gone are the days when a brand owner had to take their product to a wholesaler, stockist, super stockist, or a modern trade purchase merchandiser. All you have to do today to start selling is list your product on any one of these ecommerce websites where, most of which don’t charge even a listing fee, and start selling to their customer base of millions of consumers. Snap! Just like that, you’ve launched your product that sits on the shelf with visibility to millions of customers.
Coming to the point where we come in as a Stand up Pouch Manufacturer. We help your brand achieve a big brand presence. Just because you are a startup doesn’t mean your product needs to look like one. Our digital print technology without cylinders or plates helps you launch your product with packaging that’s not at par with a big MNC brand but Better!
Our core competence lies in printing ultra-low quantity short runs of pouches in any pouch format. Standup Pouches tend to be our highest-selling pouch format for digitally printed pouches.
The advantages of using standup pouches over any other pouch format are significant, and that’s the reason for their highly widespread adoption. They offer excellent shelf visibility compared to center seal, pillow pouches, or 3-side seal pouches because these pouches stay erect on the shelf providing excellent front panel visibility. Moreover, additional add-ons like resealable zippers, tear notches, round corners, euro holes, round holes, and printed bottom gusset options can be added in standup pouches as an add-on. We offer MATT, glossy, and spot UV finish combined with metallic foiling effects. We, as pouch makers of these printed pouches, offer you, the brand owner, a detailed consultation over a phone or video call with any one of our senior packaging specialists. Instapac acts as a pouch maker that’s not only just a supplier of pouches but also a key part of the growth of your brand.
Advantages of Standup Pouches
A clean front and Back Panel
Printed standup pouches have a totally clean and flat front and back panel. What this means is that, unlike center seal pouches where the front and back panels bulge due to nitrogen flushing. Standup pouches have flat panels that do not cause any hindrance in the design visibility. Moreover, center seal pouches have a strip that runs along the back panel of the pouch, because of which the design needs to be split into two halves. The result of this split is that the design tends to look cramped and virtually nonreadable to a customer who pickups up the product and has a second to decide whether to put the product in the basket or kart. It’s much easier to design a standup pouch over the center or three-side seal pouches because of the broad canvas that’s available to the designer without any disturbances in the panel.
Reclosable Zipper
One of the main advantages of standup pouches is that they have the option to add a zipper. About 9 out of 10 orders we process include a zipper in the pouch. The cost addition for adding a zipper ranges from Rs.0.20/- pc for a 100 grams pouch to Rs.0.80/- pc for a 1 kg pouch. Zippers are preferred by a consumer because they then do not have to transfer the contents of the pouch to a separate container after opening the pouch. The pouch itself acts as a container, and the reclosable zipper acts as a cap. This eliminates the hassle of purchasing containers, washing them, finding storage space for them, and, most importantly, finding the right one on your kitchen shelf.
Tear Notches
One of the advantages of standup pouches is that they offer tear notches that ensure clean and easy wearability to open the pouch after its purchase by the consumer. We offer two tear notches on top for all our standup pouches as a standard option. Tear notches that we offer can be added on the bottom as well for three side seal pouches and center seal pouches as well. Instapac is the only company in India that offers center seal pouches with two tear notches, i.e., in the bottom as well as on top.
Round Corners
One of the most unappreciated and ignored features of any printed pouch is round corners on all edges. Round corners are nothing but right-angled corners in a pouch that is trimmed for a smooth edge, somewhat like a semicircle. This really small ad which seems like a negligible feature, enhances the overall look of the pouch by a huge quantum. We offer round corners as a standard feature in all of our pouches. We are, in fact of, the only printed pouch manufacturers that offer round corners with a double semi-laminate cut, including cut-on-a-spot uv laminate. We can add round corners in 3 side seal pouches, 2 side seal pouches, and spout pouches as well. The round corners option is not available in center seal pouches.
Printed Bottom Gusset
The bottom gusset is the bottom part of the pouch that helps the pouch expand and helps retain the contents once filled. Once the contents are filled, the bottom gusset holds the majority of the content, and its weight increases the center of gravity, thus helping it stand. People referred to these pouches as sandy pouches when they were introduced because of the feature of the bottom gusset that helps these pouches stand and stay erect on the shelf.
Excellent Barrier Properties
A standup pouch offers excellent barrier properties, not because it’s multilayered or acts as an aluminum pouch. But because the quad seal we offer in the bottom gusset acts as a multi-seal rigid airtight gap barrier. This means the pouch format itself offers an increased shelf life of 18-23% over a conventional pouch format like a center seal, three-sided sealed, two sides sealed, spout, or bar shape pouch. Pouch makers today offer standup pouches without this technology, whereas pouch makers like us offer this feature as a standard option among all our standup pouches and stand pouches.
Summarizing all of this, I hope by now it is clear why you, as a brand owner, would find standup pouches the best pouch format over any other conventional pouch format. But every pouch format has its own advantages and disadvantages. This pouch format does too. I’ll be writing about the disadvantages of standup pouches in my next blog and also an alternative that seems like a better option because it checks out all the disadvantages of a standup pouch in its advantages column.
