PLA film

Pla film (Polylactic acid) is an advanced type of packaging to apply onto the containers of soft drinks and dairy products. It is called heat-shrinkable sleeves. These sleeves are made by plastic films such as PET, OPS and PVC film. These films are very special types of plastic film because they are shrinkable in the hot air blown by heat tunnel in the machine. These films are printed by press machine according to the designs to be used for product labels for the containers of soft drinks and dairy products. After that, the printed films are seemed like tube and winded on the core to be a roll. These rolls are unwound on the sleeving machine to wrap the containers of soft drinks or dairy products and they get through the heat tunnel. Finally final products with sleeves are made, which we pick them up on the selves at the mart.

You can see and check with the sleeves on the container carefully when you buy soft drinks or dairy products. You can imagine how the shrink sleeves can be stuck without glue on the containers, moreover on the such intricate shape of the container. It is possible because the material of the sleeve is heat-shrinkable as if the containers wear stoking.

Recently eco-friendly material was developed and it is called PLA shrink film made of corn starch. Unlike petroleum-based films such as PET, OPS and PVC film, PLA film is naturally bio-degradable. So, it is expected that the firms concerned about environmental-friendly policy will be interested in this newly developed packaging material.

Reference : Packaging Digest, PLA shrink labels get the 'green' light, 1/1/2008