If only life is better with changes then adoption of change is a necessary action to consider even if it is the protector of many things, packaging. Driven by ever new-life-getting technology, packaging now-a-days has become a face for smart things through incorporating latest technologies and trends.
Do you ever think a pack in your hand can help you interact with the brand owner of the product to get information? Or can anyone assume a food container that cares like your mom and makes your hands off from container after finding food in the box got spoiled? Well, these kinds of innovative packaging inventions will become our everyday fun with the packaging called interactive or smart packaging integrated with RFID tags. The usage of RFID tags in packaging opens new avenues for greater safety, convenience and quality while moving with a mission to offer necessary information to consumers in the right moment.
Keeping consumers’ safety as the primary factor eAgile, a popular RFID systems provider has recently unveiled an integrated tag called ‘Dual Wing’ which astonishingly incorporated two frequencies UHF and NFC in it. In contrast to conventional applications, which may use either UHF or NFC frequency relying on the purpose, Dual Wing uses both the frequencies to bring up supply chain and consumer engagement option in a single integrated tag.
Dual Wing provides an interactive packaging solution that can forge an interaction between a consumer and a brand owner. For instance, if you’re in a drug store and finding difficulty to choose a medicine from many products racked up in the store, you can simply connect to the brand owner and get information with the help of Dual Wing employed package and an NFC enabled smart phone by tapping phone over the product package. Once tapped, you’ll be connected to the brand owner immediately and can access information like expiry date of the drug, dosage amount to be taken, does it had been into any recall, is the product authentic, does it have any side effects etc.
RFID technology that is set to provide information about drugs is also in the forefront to guide food lovers when they choose food packages. A Northern Europe based research organization, VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland had researched and developed an RFID based system that can detect and alert people about ethanol formed due to food spoilage. With this, consumers can stay in a safe zone by receiving information from the wireless sensor that is able to detect the condition of food in a package.
Researchers combined a wireless sensor that can find the spoilage in chopped fresh fruits with a printable RF tag and arranged it underneath the package label. If there is any formation of ethanol in food package, the sensor senses and sends information to consumer which can be accessed through near field communication (NFC) enabled smartphone. The data is sent via a reader, it can also be used from a remote server which stored it digitally, with the help of a smart phone.
