December 20th, 2011 by packagingsupplies
If you have leftover shipping supplies that you don’t know what to do with, get creative! Here are some things that you and your kids can do with those unwanted mailing tubes. If you don’t have any lying around, you can also get them at very little cost at any store that sells shipping supplies.
Rain Stick
To make those soothing rain sounds, you don’t need to wait on the weather. All you need as a mailing tube, some foil, a hot-glue gun, some rice and corn kernels, and a broom handle. Roll the foil lengthwise so that you have a rope of sorts. Wrap this around a broom handle to create a coil and stretch it out to the length of the mailing tube. Keep in mind that you can cut the mailing tube to any desired length. Put the foil in the tube and hot glue gun the ends to the inside. Then glue one cap onto one end of the tube and let your child pour in the rice and corn kernels, then glue the other cap on. Decorate the tube by painting, coloring or gluing and you’ve got a new rain stick that you made together!
Bangle
To make this unique fashion accessory, cut the tube into small, bangle- or cuff-sized circles. Cut out part of the circle to create an opening for the arm. Take any colorful fabric, tulle is especially cute, and cut it and inch or two thick and about a yard long, and wrap it from end to end of the bangle. Tie the ends in a knot and use a glue gun to attach the excess fabric to the inside of the bangle. You can buy grommets and use pliers to fasten them onto the cardboard for a rock and roll look, or you can use a hot glue gun to add beads and sparkles. Voilà! Cool new bracelet!
Race Track
This is a simple and fun way to construct a new track to race toy cars on. Just take the mailing tubes and cut them down the middle. You can paint them to look like a road by spray-painting them black and drawing yellow lines, or just decorate them in wacky colors. Use them to build a new racetrack or slide for the toy cars to cruise on!
Tags: brown mailing tube, Mailing Tubes, shipping supplies
Posted in Mailing Tubes, Mailing and Shipping Tubes | No Comments »
December 15th, 2011 by packagingsupplies
While corrugated cardboard isn’t usually perceived to be a pinnacle of high technology, the material is one of the most specially engineered based on an arched paper design known as fluting. This is the if you rip off the topmost piece of paper you can clearly see the fluting in cardboard. This fluting provides increased compression strength making the material extremely durable, easily producible, space-effective due to it’s folding design. There are three benefits to using corrugated cardboard as your packaging supply of choice.
Protective Qualities
In addition to the compression strength, fluting provides the contents of any box with superior cushioning. During shipping if objects inside move around, the fluting compresses slightly to absorb the impact. Corrugated boxes can vary in sizes, thickness, and layers of fluting for greater cushioning and durability. Finally corrugated material has tear resistant properties to keep the packaging pristine and protect products during the shipping cycle.
Custom Packaging
Machines used to make corrugated cardboard can be calibrated fairly easily to produce boxes of different dimensions. There are many different cardboard types, weights, adhesives and treatments. You can pick and choose among these qualities depending on the design of your packaging. Options range for simple inexpensive solutions to complex packaging for ample protection or visual appeal. You can also choose to have cardboard printed with your company logo, and even treated with flame resistant chemicals. Pretty much anything you can imagine you can achieve through all of the options corrugated cardboard provides.
Cost-Effective
Cardboard boxes usually rank on the bottom in terms of shipping packaging prices. This is because cardboard is easy to produce and lightweight, reducing shipping costs to a minimum. Cardboard can be used to achieve multiple purposes such as shipping, storage, and even advertising and brand-building.
Tags: corrugated bin boxes, corrugated cardboard
Posted in Cardboard Shipping Boxes, Corrugated Boxes | No Comments »
December 12th, 2011 by packagingsupplies
So lately we are thinking about ways that other businesses using environmentally-safe shipping supplies can help develop a reputation as a “green” or, at least, conscientious business. With the surge in the “Green” movement, many people are voting with their dollars for businesses that care about the environment. When a customer receives your product in eco-friendly packaging, they’ll feel good about ordering from you again in the future.
Sustainable packaging is either itself recyclable or made from a large percentage of recycled materials, and is used for a wide range of consumer products. It comes in many forms such as paper products made from pre- and post-consumer waste, and plastic substitute materials. Paper-based materials made from high content post consumer waste (PCW) are less expensive, and more widely available due to technological advances in recycling and reprocessing. Naturally, the more recycled materials used in your packaging the less trees were harmed to produce it.
Perhaps the biggest challenge for packaging manufacturers is material reduction. It should come as no surprise that the more material volume used to make packaging supplies, the less environmentally friendly they will be. The exception is in supplies made from as much recycled material as possible. As time progresses and the green movement continues to build momentum, more advances to our shipping supply technology will undoubtedly offer us even greater options.
Tags: eco friendly packaging supplies, ecofriendly shipping supplies
Posted in Packaging Shipping & Mailing Bags, Shipping Boxes, Wholesale Packaging Supplies | No Comments »
December 6th, 2011 by packagingsupplies
Today’s online shoppers demand their products to be shipped with exact product volumes and in increasingly smaller time windows. For a fulfillment house, it can be difficult to achieve both the speed and flexibility to pack and ship random mixes of items and have them delivered when the client needs them, sometimes within days or hours. Often the most common bottlenecks in fulfillment houses are the set up of shipping supplies (i.e. boxes) and cushioning processes. These also offer the greatest opportunity for improving the time and quality of order fulfillment.
Case erectors or formers are machines in to which magazines of boxes and cartons are fed. The machine then folds and squares up the box and seals any seams with pressure sensitive tape or adhesive. If you do not already use a Case former machine, you can save tons in labor costs by installing one. Some machines even have quick changeover systems for different box sizes. While cycle times vary due to box size and the number of changeovers, rates of 12 to 40 boxes per minute are pretty standard. When using machines like this, it is essential that the quality and consistency of the corrugated boxes are kept to a high standard. If cases are damaged, wet or out of square they can jam the machine, and shut down operations.
Void fill, cushioning and product stabilization can also be automated to reduce cycle times. Void fill can be delivered to the packaging line and engineered to accommodate any number of distribution requirements. Systems can be semi or fully automatic, and when delivered on-demand are done so in a pre-determined amount or at a predetermined rate. You may want to consult the manufacturer of these delivery systems and discuss ways to customize your delivery system. This will depend on the value and fragility of the packaged products, the mode of transportation, and the size of the void to be filled.
By automating these two components of packaging supply delivery, you are guaranteed to experience much faster cycle times in your packaging line.
Tags: shipping supplies, shipping supply
Posted in Miscellaneous Shipping Supplies, Wholesale Packaging Supplies | No Comments »
