Food Bags, and Why the Plates, Not the Film, Set the Minimum

What Buyers Get Wrong

Choosing the Pouch Before the Filling Line

A stand-up pouch needs a spout inserter or a top-seal sealer. If your co-packer runs bottles only, the pack changes supplier.

Barrier by Assumption

PET/PE is fine for dry goods; oils and aromatics need aluminium or EVOH, which then breaks the recyclability claim.

Digital Printing At 10,000

Rotogravure is cheaper above roughly 20,000; digital wins below 5,000 despite the higher unit price.

When a Pouch Beats a Bottle

A stand-up pouch uses less plastic per litre, ships flat before filling, and takes a valve or a zipper. For refill formats and e-commerce it is usually the lower in unit cost pack, and the one that survives a courier better than a rigid bottle.

The trade-off is shelf presence: a pouch stands, but it does not read as premium the way a thick-wall jar does. Most brands use both: bottle for the shelf, pouch for the refill.

Material and MOQ

Standard structures are PET/PE for dry and semi-liquid products, with an aluminium or EVOH layer where barrier is needed. Printing is rotogravure, which is why pouches start at 10,000 pcs rather than 1,000: the plates are the cost, not the film.

Structures and When Each Is Used

Stand-up pouch with a bottom gusset: the default for refills and liquids, 100 ml to 3 L, takes a spout or a valve. Three-side-seal flat pouch: samples and single servings, 5-100 ml, the lowest unit cost of the three. Kraft stand-up pouch: dry goods and coffee, with or without a window, usually with an aluminium layer for barrier.

The structure decides the barrier. PET/PE is enough for dry and semi-liquid products; adding an aluminium or EVOH layer extends shelf life for oils and aromatics but makes the pouch unrecyclable in most streams, which matters if the brand is making a recyclability claim.

Why the MOQ Is 10,000, Not 1,000

Pouches are printed rotogravure. Each colour needs a cylinder, and a set of cylinders costs more than the film for a small run. That is the whole reason the minimum is 10,000 rather than the 1,000 we can do on bottles: it is plates, not plastic. Digital printing is available at lower volumes at a higher unit price.

Filling and Sealing

A stand-up pouch needs a filling line with a spout inserter or a top-seal sealer; a three-side-seal pouch runs on a form-fill-seal machine. If your co-packer only runs bottles, the pouch moves the filling to a different supplier, which is worth knowing before the pack is chosen.

Shelf life testing also changes: a pouch has a higher surface-to-volume ratio than a bottle, so barrier requirements go up quickly for oils and aromatics.

If the pouch is a refill for a bottle you already sell, keep the fitment identical across both packs: a spout that does not match the bottle neck turns a refill into a complaint.

Inverted Pouch: the Spout at the Wrong End

An inverted pouch puts the spout at the bottom, so the product sits on it and the last portion pours without tilting. It is the standard pack for sauces, pastes and refill concentrates — and for anything a customer uses one-handed.

The cost is in the fitment, not the film: an inverted spout needs a heavier valve and a wider base seal, which adds roughly 15-20 % to the bag cost at 10,000 pcs. It also cannot stand on a shelf the way a bottom-gusset pouch does; most brands ship it with a small plastic hanger or a secondary carton.

Applications for This Range

• Distributors stocking three to five SKUs for the same market
• Brands launching a first range at 1,000–5,000 pcs per colour
• Contract fillers who need closures fitted and tested before the line
• Private-label programmes that change colour every season
• Export orders that need packing data before the freight quote

The Guides Behind These Decisions