FEFCO: The history of corrugated

The origin of Corrugated

The history of corrugated dates back to more than a century ago.
Corrugated was born from a new paper usage and from the increasing necessity to pack and protect goods.
Thanks to its basic raw materials, and despite considerable changes, modern corrugated packaging is not so different than that of our great grandfathers.
This ingenuous construction is and will remain profitable, modern, and innovative.

Some important dates

1856
Two Englishmen, Healey and Allen, obtained a patent for the first known use of corrugated.
The paper was fed through a very simple hand machine made of 2 fluted rolls. The result was a nice fluted paper used as the lining in hats.

1871
The first use of corrugated paper for packaging was by an American man, Albert L.
Jones who obtained a patent for the use of corrugated paper for wrapping fragile items such as bottles.

1874
Again in the United States, Olivier Long patented the concept of adding a liner to one side of the corrugated paper to strengthen it.

1881
Some US manufacturers considered as the corrugated pioneers acquired the patents covering this new packaging concept.

They concentrated their efforts on developing new machinery. The Thompson and Norris company created the first mechanically-driven single-facer (one liner) and introduced the first 3 European Corrugators in Europe.

1883 London (UK)

1886 Kirchberg (Germany)

1888 Exideuil-sur-Vienne (France)

1895 Independant Equipment producers enter the corrugated business production. The first continuous corrugator was developed by Jefferson T. Ferres of the Sefton
Manufacturing CO.

The first corrugating machines appeared at the start of the century.

(suite History)
A century of continuous innovations and adaptation to the changing world
The production of corrugated packaging has showed rapid growth. It has accompanied the industrial revolution and has responded to the steady demand for more transport packaging. Corrugated production closely follows economic activity.
Today it adapts to the constant evolution of the retail trade and its continually changing logistics requirements.
Since the end of the 19th century, many changes have occurred and remarkable progress has been made in the improvement of raw materials, in the equipment, in the production processes and the printing techniques of corrugated packaging.

Some examples are listed below :

The number of paper grades used for the production of corrugated is continuously increasing. The choice and the quality of all different liners and fluting is constantly improving.
The production speed increased dramatically with the improvement of equipment.
This is also true on the user side, thanks to high speed case erector, filler and closer
The use of Computer has revolutionized the industry by permitting continuous runs and avoiding machine stops. Its impact was also considerable on pack design and order processing. Progresses of course are not over and the era of Information Technology has just began.
In the last decade, the new printing techniques probably brought the biggest changes. The changing role of packaging from logistics to marketing functions, the use of bar codes for product identification have required improving the quality of graphics on corrugated packaging.

Small flutes and high quality paper give a very high standard of graphics which offer new prospects in end-use markets.

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