The research was carried out in October and involved more than 2,000 adult consumers.
86% of the people surveyed said they believed that concerns about safety and hygiene would remain even when the pandemic is over.
More than 77% said they considered the hygiene of products and packaging when their purchases were delivered, or when browsing in stores.
James Cropper described hygiene as now being “the number one concern” around packaging.
The survey also found that 62% would choose to buy something packaged in a material that fought pathogens such as Covid-19, MRSA and Norovirus if they were aware the product had special packaging.
The Cumbrian papermaker’s PaperGard innovation uses Addmaster’s Biomaster silver-ion antimicrobial treatment, which is built into the paper during manufacturing and remains active for the life of the product.
It is effective against both bacteria and viruses.
PaperGard has been tested against the ISO 18184 standard and is “now proven to be effective at reducing the presence of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19, on the surface of paper”, James Cropper stated.
The tests showed that in 15 minutes PaperGard reduced the viability of the virus by more than 95%, rising to 99.9% within two hours.
James Cropper marketing and technical director Richard Bracewell commented: “PaperGard has been part of our range since 2006 but since the pandemic the demand for this kind of protected paper packaging has increased. These recent tests clearly demonstrate the effectiveness of the product on the paper surface against SARS-CoV-2, the enveloped virus that is responsible for Covid-19.”
PaperGard has already been regularly used for the production of medical and healthcare documents, but the technology can also be applied across James Cropper’s range of paper products, which includes papers and boards for premium packaging or greetings cards “that are subject to a lot of handling”.
The qualities of the paper are not affected by the treatment. However, if a design involved completely over-printing the surface or an overall varnish, then the recommended solution would be to include the Biomaster treatment in the print or varnish.
