When walking down an aisle at the grocery store, we are all bombarded with the results of vacuum packaging, although we don’t notice it because we aren’t aware that that is what it is called. Or to be more specific, we don’t care. We care about the food inside not how the packaging that keeps it fresh and edible for us is done. However, this vacuum forming process that we take for granted is actually a fascinating process that is utilized in many more contexts then just the packaging of food. Although the food industry’s vacuum packaging needs alone will keep vacuum packaging facilities in business for many years to come.

The two major characteristics gained by packaging food products with vacuum formed plastics are visibility and longevity. Vacuum packaging is not limited to clear plastic, but the fact that polyethylene and polypropylene, one of which is completely clear and one of which is translucent, are both such cheap and easy plastics to use means visibility is no problem when a food product needs to be completely wrapped up. Since visibility is not a problem, this also means that the vacuum packaging completely removes the air from around the product, which increases its longevity on the shelf and its quality when eaten. Meat and cheese are two hard to keep items that have benefited exponentially from vacuum packaging.

Outside of the food industry, which is a huge fan of vacuum packaging, other arenas also utilize this technique. For example, storage facilities and commercial settings sometimes utilize vacuum packaging to decrease the size of a product so that more can be stored in a small space. This mostly applies to home goods such as blankets, pillows and clothing. Such vacuum packaging devices are also sold on smaller scales for home use now as well. other industries who use vacuum packaging include industrial manufacturing.