Universal vs. Dedicated Equipment: How Econo-Pak Helps Food Brands Scale
Choosing the right packaging equipment can make or break a food brand’s success. At Econo-Pak, we offer both universal and dedicated equipment, giving brands the flexibility to test different formats before scaling up. In this post, we break down the differences between these equipment types, why major retailers like Walmart and Costco require unique packaging, and how our turnkey solutions help brands grow efficiently.

Sarah Richter: Wow. Cheers.
Mike Mead: Good morning. Happy Monday.
Understanding Equipment in Contract Packaging
Sarah Richter: Happy Monday. So today we want to talk about equipment, which we have a lot of, especially as we’re expanding our facility. And frequently the question comes up when we’re talking through our capability stack with prospects and even current clients about our equipment and the difference between universal and dedicated equipment. So maybe you could talk through that a little bit.
What’s the Difference Between Universal and Dedicated Equipment?
Mike Mead: Yeah, definitely. It’s an interesting part of the conversation. So having the capabilities deck and talking about, hey, we have over 200 different types of packaging equipment that’s across a lot of different formats and a lot of different options that we can work with.
And so it’s kind of like how do you decide which equipment’s going to be best for projects? A lot of times brands are trying to still discover do they want to do a pillow pouch, do they want to have a pre-made standup pouch? What are my different fill options sizes? It all plays into how they want to position themselves in the market. So what we do is we invest in more kind of, I want to call it universal equipment where it can do a lot of different things and can work with a lot of different formats.
So not only do we have a large inventory of equipment, we also have a large inventory of former sizes and things that we can work with those packaging formats.
How Universal Equipment Helps Brands Test and Scale
Mike Mead: So one way we get started with our clients, we present kind of, Hey, we can help you. We can do these things. And a lot of times they’re not fully invested in one specific type of format. So it makes it really convenient for them to have the options with us to explore different types of packaging styles, different fill weights and things for the market.
And then as we start working with the client and they start getting a larger forecast and more confidence in the market and the type of packaging that they picked for their project, or maybe they get into a different type of the marketplace versus like a club store versus a grocery store or convenience. Those are all different packaging formats. They get a large enough forecast where we’re going to be running very consistently and then we can move them to a dedicated piece of equipment that we have our engineers kind of focus and make specifically just for that project to run at the best speeds.
So it might run a little bit faster now that it’s dedicated, maybe we can create some automation on the line where we have less people, less touch points on the project so we can help reduce the price driving efficiencies and cost savings for our clients, our partners, but also for us. So I think it’s an interesting feature that we have as a company being able to have that much inventory and capacity.
Why Do Retailers Like Walmart and Costco Require Different Packaging?
Sarah Richter: Yeah, that’s a great offering for our clients. And I have a question. Why is it that certain markets have different sizing like Walmart versus Costco? What is the difference there and why?
Mike Mead: There’s a few things. So one is sometimes price point driven. So some retailers will have a specific type of price point that they’re trying to achieve for a type of product that they’re going to carry or an offering so that they can be very competitive in the market. So they might want to reduce the fill weight in the packaging, maybe go with a smaller package or maybe a larger package with less fill weight, vice versa, things like that. Costco or Sam’s Club or something like that. Some of the box stores they have, it’s a larger quantity or it’s multiple packs wrapped together.
And again, they’re trying to achieve a value added for their clients and for their customers that come into the store. So having the options here with the equipment to be able to do all those things helps our partners explore different market segments to grow their brand. So they’re not just specifically put into this one category where it’s one size package has to fit the entire market because we just know that doesn’t work.
Retailer Exclusivity: Why Walmart, Amazon, and Others Want Unique SKUs
Mike Mead: You also have where exclusivity. So maybe you have your products and you sell them in grocery and you have a bunch of different places you’re presenting it to Walmart and maybe Walmart wants to be different than they want to have your product. They love your brand, they love what you’re offering, but they want to stand out in the marketplace, so they want something that’s exclusive to them.
So maybe the rest of the market yields a five ounce package, but Walmart wants to be the seven ounce package or just the stand out. Amazon’s another one that does that as well. They want to have something that’s different than the rest of the market for a lot of brands. And we have that flexibility. So we bring in the client’s bulk and we can package it to serve all those different market areas for them without having our clients have to buy five different types of equipment to be able to accomplish those same goals. We can do that here with our equipment.
Real-World Example: Helping a Pretzel Brand Optimize Packaging
Sarah Richter: That’s awesome. We’re actually currently talking to a prospect right now. They have a pretzel that’s going to be going onto the market and they are sending, they’re samples to us and they’re going to be asking our project manager and Mike, our VP, to look at the packaging and determine if it’s going to be the best size for our equipment and for their preferred market, especially the head space between the pretzels, the nitrogen flush that goes into it. So it’s just awesome that we’re able to provide that entire turnkey service for our clients.
Scaling Food Brands with a Flexible Co-Packing Partner
Mike Mead: Absolutely. And it’s a really exciting time for us to, obviously our job is to prove ourselves and prove what we can do. And the way with universal equipment and universal flexibility and what we can offer them allows us that opportunity to build that trust and build that confidence within the partnership.
And then what we can do in return is as we start to grow that relationship is invest in more dedicated solutions for them to drive those. So it is really exciting and you and I are fortunate that we get to talk to so many different types of clients and get to really learn about what are they trying to accomplish, and then my job and all of our job is to try to create the best solution for them. So Econo-Pak, having so much, so many different capabilities, it makes it really unique and it allows us to explore. So there’s a lot of creativity that can go into every single project because we want all of our client partners to be different and we want them to stand out in the market and continue to grow.
Sarah Richter: Yeah, totally agree. Well, thank you for sharing all that information today.
Mike Mead: Absolutely. Thank you and have a great day.
Sarah Richter: Yeah, you too.
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With over 40 years of experience working with both small brands and Fortune 500 companies, we are capable of handling your specific dry food product.
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