In any industry or profession with a high degree of craft and skill involved, precision matters. And it really doesn’t matter what industry or profession you’re talking about. At the top level, everybody is sweating the small stuff. It’s what separates the good from the great.
Movie editors work to 1/24th of a second. Footballers pass to teammates 100 metres away. And Formula 1 drivers are threading the eye of the needle at over 200mph.
Manufacturing shouldn’t be any different; at a certain level, it pays to be precise. In fact, the tolerances in Formula 1 component fabrication are so stringent, so impossibly tight, that engines simply seize unless brought up to operating temperature. The thermal expansion of the materials is baked into the design – and nothing will work until it has expanded to the right size with heat.
That’s some pretty wild engineering.
Packaging tolerances at the highest level need to be super tight, too. Enter NPF Packaging: Narrow Polythene Films by name, narrow polythene films by nature. We’re able to give our customers 20mm polythene bags and films – in the form of super narrow banding film, or narrow bags made for specialist packaging solutions.
It pays to be precise
It might seem obvious, but narrow bags and films require less material to manufacture – so they tend to cost less. But there’s also a huge benefit in terms of protection. A good fit beats a loose fit, any day of the week – especially with delicate and high-precision items where any kind of play in packaging is undesirable.
It’s a mark of quality, a show of dedication. It shows customers that you’re willing to extend the care you give to them to your packaging design, and create a solution bespoke to the needs of the product. It adds to the customer experience, gives greater product protection, and has cumulative cost savings throughout the chain.
Right-sized, perfect-fit product packaging is cheaper to ship, easier to store and faster to apply to products. And when you use polythene packaging that fits, you get consistent performance characteristics across all your products. This means predictable behaviour across environments and applications, for higher confidence and satisfaction in your packaging and product.
Clearly, there’s a lot to like – but what kind of applications are we talking about?
What are 20mm bags used for?
20mm polythene bags might seem ludicrously narrow by manual packaging standards – but in the world of machine films, narrow is pretty common. 20mm bags are great for automated lines and speedy manual packaging, for round-section products of a fixed size and narrow width (up to 12 or 13 millimetres). Think bars, tubes, pipes, bolts, or small cylindrical componentry.
Learn more about long narrow bags – and if LFT is a better choice for you.
What is 20mm polythene film used for?
20mm film isn’t going to be formed into any kind of complex shapes. But it is really useful stuff! The most common use of very narrow polythene film is as banding film, AKA collation film.
Read more: Banding Film: What Is It And How To Use It?
While it can be used manually, at narrower widths like 20mm, banding film is used in automated packaging lines to bundle items together tightly – thanks to its semi-elastic qualities. It’s also found in highly specialised packaging systems, where it is sealed into loops to tightly bind products together.
Print stock and soft items can be bound non-destructively, with minimal packaging. It provides tension and security, without the risk of cutting into boxes or applying too much force.
So, while you could just use oversized, off the shelf packaging to meet your requirements, you should be asking yourself; “will this reach our product and brand goals?”.
If the answer is no, then it’s time to get a proper, made to measure solution. And with widths as low as 19mm available for our polythene bags and films, NPF Packaging has everything you need to get started – including a bespoke packaging design service.
Narrow, 20mm polythene bags and film rolls
Order custom-made 20mm polythene bags, for high-precision packaging. Choose 20mm film for banding and collation. Call us on 01773 820415 to start your order or get a quote online.
