Gressingham slashes carbon footprint with linerless labels

As the main supplier of duck in the UK, Gressingham Foods has released new linerless labels on its packaging that makes huge strides in reducing environmental impact and saving manpower.  

The brand has teamed up with Coveris and Ravenwood to give its fresh duck portion products a new look that will reduce its carbon footprint and save over 24 tons of waste material per year.  

Rebecca Alderton, brand manager at Gressingham Foods, said: ‘Working with Coveris and Ravenwood has been hugely successful, with both companies understanding our two-part vision to reduce our carbon footprint, whilst retaining our premium look and feel.  

‘As one of the only independent brands in the meat, fish and poultry aisle, we needed the linerless labels to mimic the appearance of the sleeve packaging as much as possible in order to retain our brand recognition and shelf appeal, whilst proving that more eco-friendly packaging changes can be achieved in the sector.’  

The new linerless labels from Coveris replace the brand’s previous labor-intensive and time-consuming three-tier packaging process, which involved Darfresh film on thermoformers on portions of fresh and raw duck and then hand-applying cardboard sleeves to every pack. A third stage was sometimes used to apply a promotional label. In terms of manpower it could involve up to six people.  

With less weight, reduced waste and fewer reel changeovers required, the packaging refresh has streamlined operations and resulted in a carbon emissions saving of 3,400 CO2 in kg per year. This is a lightweight and sustainable packaging alternative that will save the brand 24 tons of material per year.  

The new packaging will roll out on shelves from April 2023, across all outlets.