Open Post #7: Package Testing - Drop Test

Packaging engineers spend great lengths of time creating, designing, and constructing a package to meet the needs of a specific product, but people often fail to recognize the last step they take before the package can reach the market - package testing. This step is vital in the overall process because it tells the engineers whether or not the package they made works.

My packaging class recently had two guest speakers from the Amway Cosmetics and Skin Care Packaging team come in, and they taught me several things about packaging and especially package testing. Amway is a corporation that owns popular brands relating to home, beauty, and nutrition care; these brands are eSpring, Nutrilite, Artistry, and Legacy of Clean. Because the two women worked as packaging professionals in Artistry, the cosmetics and skin care area, the package testing techniques they talked about were expressed in relation to makeup tubes, bottles, jars, and palettes.

The speakers explained that package testing includes not just the testing of the primary package, but package materials, components, shipping containers, and unit loads. Package testing is generally one of two types: lab testing or consumer testing. Lab testing refers to physical, chemical, and performance testing, food safety approval, research and developmental support, and testing to comply with vendor standards. Consumer testing refers to subjective evaluations by people to test things such as packages with child-resistant or tamper evident features.

drop test

There are 70 standardized laboratory tests that Amway might use on a package, one of the most popular being The Drop Test. This test is pretty self explanatory - the machine drops the package in different positions, heights, etc. to test the effects of certain falls on the package and the product. This machine does not always tests the primary package (package that makes direct contact with the product), but more so the secondary or tertiary package (the package containing the primary package). The women shared a video of their Drop Test Machine, but with my inability to access that, I'm going to instead share a video that I found of a basic drop test machine testing a secondary package.
Click Here To Watch

While watching, I noticed the different trials, alterations with each drop, and noted the surface they dropped it on. These are all key steps in testing whether or not the package that was constructed is suitable for the product it entails. What things did you notice?

Sources Cited
"Classic DROP TEST for Package." Youtube. Youtube, 17 July 2012. Web. 14 Mar. 2016.
"Packaging Testing Services." Packaging Testing Services. Web. March. 2016.