PetFood PRO 3/2025

PACKAGING
Sustainable Flexible Packaging
for Pet Brands: Perspective on
Recyclable-Ready Pouches
Pet owners expect high-quality nutrition with minimal environmental impact.
Retailers demand efficient logistics and shelf-ready solutions. Regulators
require packaging that can be collected, sorted, and truly recycled. At Tyler
Packaging, we see recyclable-ready mono-material pouches – typically all-PE
or all-PP structures – as the packaging solution that aligns all three priorities.
These pouches are increasingly becoming the default choice across dry food,
dry treats, wet-food, toppers, supplements, and refill formats.
Why Mono-Material Pouches?
Traditional multi-layer laminates blend
polymers and foil to achieve stiffness,
barrier protection, printability, and
sealability. While these materials perform
well in use, they fail at end-of-life: mixed
structures are extremely difficult to
recycle.
Mono-material pouches, by contrast, use
layers from the same polymer family (e.g.,
PE/PE with EVOH barriers), allowing the
package to behave as a single material
in recycling streams. This results in better
sortability, higher yield, and a credible
path toward circularity.
The Weight & Sustainability
Advantage
Flexible pouches are lighter than rigid
formats, reducing energy use, transport
emissions, and storage needs. Lifecycle
assessments consistently show that:
• Mono-PE or mono-PP pouches deliver
lower carbon footprints than multimaterial
laminates.
• Lighter packs allow more units per pallet,
fewer miles per tonne transported, and
less back-of-store space – all without
compromising pack performance.
At Tyler Packaging, we see this as a direct
sustainability and operational advantage
for pet brands, reducing environmental
impact while improving supply chain
efficiency.
Good Practices: A Warning on
Over-Engineering
For brands to achieve recyclability, we
are seeing significant increases material
usage. Why? This is to pass drop testing,
machinability, or barrier performance
requirements by increasing film thickness
or adding extra layers to meet recyclableready
criteria. Analysis shows that, in
some cases, brands must make their
recyclable packaging up to 30% thicker
than traditional non-recyclable packs to
pass performance tests.
While this may technically achieve a
recyclable claim, it raises an important
environmental question: if more material
is being used, higher transport emissions
are generated, and more plastic enters the
recycling system, is this truly a sustainable
choice? Simply meeting recyclability
criteria does not automatically equate
to a lower overall environmental impact.
This should align with business targets,
science-based targets of the brands.
Regulatory Drivers
In the European Union, the Packaging
and Packaging Waste Regulation (PPWR)
came into effect in February 2025, with
full application following 18 months later.
By 2030, all packaging will be required
to be recyclable under harmonised
design-for-recycling criteria, and by 2035,
recyclability must be demonstrated at
scale. This means that businesses will need
to simplify packaging structures, focus on
polyethylene (PE) or polypropylene (PP)
material streams, and validate recyclability
to remain compliant.
In the United Kingdom, Extended
Producer Responsibility (EPR) will begin in
October 2025, introducing year-one fees
alongside mandatory reporting. These
fees will be modulated depending on
the material used and the recyclability of
Adam Kay,
Director
the packaging. As a result, lighter monomaterial
packs will benefit from lower fees,
while heavier, multi-layered solutions will
increase cost exposure.
How Tyler Packaging Designs
Circular Pouches
Creating circular pouch packaging begins
with selecting a dominant polymer stream.
Mono-PE structures offer forgiving seals,
good drop resistance, and effective EVOH
barrier properties. Mono-PP, on the other
hand, provides higher heat resistance,
making it suitable for retortable products.
Following Design-for-Recycling (D4R)
principles is essential. This involves
keeping barrier layers lean (less than
5–10% EVOH), avoiding PET, metallised
foil, and incompatible inks or adhesives,
and prioritising clear or light films.
Closures and fitments must also be
reconsidered. For instance, PE spouts
should be used on PE pouches and PP
zippers on PP pouches, since mixedmaterial
components compromise
recyclability. Similarly, barriers should be
tailored to product needs: dry treats often
require only oxygen and grease protection,
while wet foods may demand PP retort
pouches that are still recyclable-ready.
Performance must then be validated
through trials with recyclers and material
recovery facilities (MRFs). Third-party
certification, such as that offered by Tyler
Packaging, strengthens the credibility of
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Technology & Marketing