Awards

Ball Steeltin honored with “Can of the Year” Award

Ball’s metal food & household products division has won the 2007 Can of the Year award for its innovative screw top wax tin. Sponsored by The Canmaker magazine, The Can of the Year awards recognize design and innovation excellence for commercial metal packaging. The award was presented Oct. 1 at a dinner following The Canmaker Summit in Chicago. The winning entry was designed in conjunction with Meguiar’s, Inc., an Irvine, Calif. based manufacturer of premium surface care products.

Employees at Ball’s Baltimore plant designed, built and installed a new manufacturing line to produce the tin. The screw top dome lid tin is a meld of form and function and offers several unique features. The dome lid is designed to keep the applicator sponge clean and dry during distribution. A removable, clear plastic tray locks the sponge in the dome lid, allowing the consumer to replace the sponge in the dome cavity after use, preventing loss or contamination.

The tin’s modular design simplifies the filling process because the lid, sponge and plastic tray components can be delivered to the customer pre-assembled. The filling site only needs to apply the cap to the filled bottom. The tin has a recessed bottom panel that promotes stacking on store shelves and reduces the need for secondary packaging. Other elements enhance the appearance of the tin.

“The can is ‘decorated in the flat,’ using distortion printing techniques,” says Bob Brashear, manager, engineering, in Baltimore. “And the drawn can bottom receives a coating of clear gloss UV varnish to inspire the appearance of a newly waxed surface.”

Ball and Meguiar’s began development of the tin in April 2006, progressing through multiple prototypes with a final design chose in August 2006. Meguiar’s Cleaner Wax and Meguiar’s Gold Class products were launched in the new tin in December 2006.

“Meguiar’s was looking for innovative paste wax packaging and worked closely with Ball to develop a unique solution,” says Mark Steiman, product manager for Meguiar’s. “Meguiar’s is a premium appearance care brand and our products deliver the highest quality surface results available. A high quality appearance is very important to us and our end users.”

The screw top dome lid wax also received the gold award in the “general line” category.