According to Packaging Strategies, current growth in single-serve and personal-size packaging for oxygen-sensitive beverages, and anticipated growth and/or conversion from glass to plastic of single-serve beer and flavored alcoholic beverages are the two most prominent drivers pushing the market for enhanced-barrier plastic containers.

Adds Gordon Bockner, the lead author of the Packaging Strategies study and president of BDA (Business Development Associates), "Although the majority of attention in this area during the past few years has focused on polyester (PET), polypropylene is making increasingly competitive advances." In the study, Bockner and BDA provide 23 cost-comparison cases and 37 detailed cost analyses; both mono- and multi-layer process technologies (for PET and PP) are assessed, including those of such leading companies as Owens-Illinois, Kortec, and Pechiney Plastic Packaging.

More information, including study cost, is available from Packaging Strategies (800/524-7225, or 610/436-4220, ext. 11, outside of US and Canada) and BDA. Visit Packaging Strategies at packstrat.com.