Well-executed packaging graphics can "sell the taste." In the highly competitive chilled-foods aisle, f'REAL! Foods, Orinda, CA, achieved this objective when switching from preprinted cups to shrink sleeves for its 10-oz serving of frozen dairy products sold at convenience stores. The family line uses polyvinyl chloride sleeves, provided by Fort Dearborn, gravure-printed in nine colors to maximize visual impact through the glass doors of cooler cases.

These changes give the brand an edge versus competitors, a key objective of the package redesign, says Jens Voges, f'REAL! Director of Operations.

"With our smoothies, we wanted to convey the fact that we had real fruit in a natural product," Voges says. "Printing photographs of real fruit was a huge advantage, something that we couldn't have done with offset printing.

"Likewise, with the milkshakes, we were looking to position them as old-fashioned, the way real milkshakes are made. We wanted a realistic, silver-metal cup look. Again, that wasn't possible with offset printing."

The sleeves are shrunk around custom-molded, tapered, high-impact polystyrene cups, supplied by Fabri-Kal.