The drive toward more sustainable solutions in the hygiene market continues to lead to innovation as companies across the supply chain are aiming to minimize the use of plastics, create products that are potentially biodegradable, recyclable or reusable and overall lessen the industry’s impact on the planet. The development of plastic-free components like acquisition-distribution layers (ADL), closure systems and nonwoven materials made from alternative raw materials has allowed companies like Pelz Group to create a plastic-free panty liner.

“For hygiene product manufacturer pelzGROUP, it is important to combine sustainability and performance to achieve broad acceptance in the market,” says Henning Röttger, head of business development. “Our panty liner meets the strict requirements of the European Single-Use Plastics Directive (SUPD) while also matching the performance of conventional synthetic products. At the same time, our new panty liner has a completely European supply chain. This means short distances and therefore low CO2 emissions.”

According to a UN Environmental Program (UNEP) study on marine litter and microplastics, eight million tons of plastic end up in the oceans every year. A significant portion of this pollution comes from single-use plastic products, including many hygiene items like fem care items, baby diapers and wipes. Innovations like the Pelz plastic-free panty liner and other developments in the hygiene market are seeking to reduce that number.

“Innovation, sustainability, and customization are paramount nowadays, with suppliers striving to meet the evolving demands of hygiene product manufacturers. The ability to offer eco-friendly solutions, tailor products to specific requirements, and maintain cost efficiency are critical elements for staying competitive in this dynamic industry,” says Estela Viegas, manager global communications of adhesives supplier H.B. Fuller. “Also, suppliers with a robust global presence and effective supply chain networks are in the best position to meet manufacturer requirements for global capability and supply consistency, while also offering local solutions tailored to market needs.”

Aplix Offers Fastening Solutions

Aplix, a manufacturer of fastening solutions based in Le Cellier, France, offers a complete product line to ensure a proper fit and a secure closure system for baby diapers and adult briefs, with solutions tailored to all market segments—premium, mainline and pants. This includes SoftGrip by Aplix (hooks and hook tapes), TexLoop by Aplix (knit loop frontal tapes), SoftLoop by Aplix (nonwoven frontal tapes) and SoftFit by Aplix (elastic ears).

Recently, the company launched a new hook platform to be able to provide customized and value-added materials (cross-over, hook on stretch, patch and single hook). And, in parallel to its petroleum-based solutions, it has replicated its complete hygiene product line using compostable materials.

According to Olivier Blanc, marketing and sales director, Aplix works diligently to source the right industrially compostable PLA materials for all of its hygiene products. The company can run PLA on its industrial lines without compromising performance or quality and materials have already been converted on several diaper lines, with different partners.

Aplix has also been developing products without adhesives, and with polypropylene-based resins, for several years with an objective to have recyclable materials which could be recycled, not only by its customers, but also by the company to be reused in production resulting in zero-waste material.

Avery Dennison Partners with Babycare

Global pressure-sensitive adhesive tapes producer Avery Dennison has partnered with Chinese baby care brand Babycare with the aim of creating healthier and safer maternity and parenting lifestyles. Babycare, an international brand with roots in China and a global perspective, has continued expanding its strategic alliance network over the past few years by selecting quality materials from partners worldwide based on product innovation and quality control. The signing of a new agreement with Avery Dennison increases Babycare’s number of its strategic partners worldwide. The array of partnerships covers a wide range of sectors, including fibers, adhesives and lighting products.

Babycare first formed a partnership with Avery Dennison in 2021. Since then, the two companies’ collaborative efforts have produced a disposable tape solution suitable for the soft bottom layer of Babycare Camellia Gentle series pull-up pants. Through joint research, the two companies have addressed pain points facing the industry by enhancing product quality and user experience through an improvement to the bonding method between the disposable tape and the outer layer material. Currently, Avery Dennison’s disposable and front waist tapes have been applied to various product lines of Babycare pull-up pants. With the new strategic partnership, Babycare and Avery Dennison expect to engage in comprehensive, in-depth collaborations involving R&D, supply chain, marketing and product quality control.

“Babycare’s core value of ‘customer mindset’ coincides with our Avery Dennison value of ‘external focus’,” says Avery Dennison Performance Tapes general manager Robin Lu. “The cooperation with Babycare aligns with the strategic direction of long-term sustainable development for Avery Dennison Performance Tapes in the Chinese personal care market.”

Glatfelter Creates Bio-based Components

Glatfelter Corporation, a leading global supplier of engineered materials, has developed its GlatPure product range targeting the hygiene market. This range of bio-based absorbent hygiene components, described as a toolbox of innovative solutions that elevate sustainability without compromising product performance, are derived from renewable materials and are for environmentally conscious consumers.

“The GlatPure range stands as a testament to our unwavering commitment to delivering top-tier performance and sustainability in absorbent hygiene products,” says Vishal Bansal, vice president of Global Innovation, ESG, and Product Sustainability. “Understanding that each component plays an important role in product excellence, we have tailored every layer to ensure they more than meet their required attributes in the application. To achieve this, we harnessed the power of multiple advanced technologies, carefully selected for their unique advantages.”

This new generation of absorbent hygiene products consists of a variety of plant-based and natural topsheets, an acquisition distribution layer, an absorbent core, a newly improved backsheet and a landing zone. Crafted with 100% renewable fibers and biodegradable materials, and enriched with bio-based binders, GlatPure stands as the industry’s first fully functional, fossil fuel-free range of solutions.
Earlier this year, the GlatPure ADL and absorbent core materials received the prestigious class 4 OK Biobased certification from TUV Austria, with the biobased carbon content of GlatPure ADL and Absorbent Core being at 100%. This certification reinforces Glatfelter’s dedication to environmental sustainability and eco-friendly practices within the absorbent hygiene industry.

The OK Biobased certification from TUV Austria is a recognized global standard for verifying the biobased content of products. It guarantees that the certified products are derived from renewable sources and meet the stringent criteria set by TUV Austria.

“We are thrilled to receive this certification for our GlatPure ADL and Absorbent Core,” says Bansal. “It is a testament to our ability to deliver eco-friendly solutions within the hygiene sector. We believe environmental stewardship and innovation go hand-in-hand, as they both play vital roles in addressing our customers’ needs and the pressing challenges of sustainability.”

Korozo Offers Wide Portfolio

The Korozo Hygiene Components business offers a wide portfolio in backsheets and frontal and closure tapes for the baby diaper, adult incontinence and feminine care categories. Its most recent products include nonwoven frontal tape, a sustainable based bamboo and cotton bearing textile backsheet, and breathable and special thinner non-breathable PE backsheet for feminine care products. The company has nine production facilities and four sales and distribution offices in the U.K., Germany, France and Russia and exports hygiene components and flexible packaging mainly to EMEA markets.

Like most suppliers to the industry, Korozo executives recognize that consumer behavior is increasingly shaped by the climate crisis, and consumers today are more interested than ever in shopping for sustainable products that truly make a difference for the environment.

Korozo’s strategy has been to reduce its carbon footprint by decreasing the amount of materials used in production, replacing them with greener alternatives, reusing its waste, and partnering with customers or suppliers to reduce consumption across the production cycle.

As demand for plant-based components has been increased in recent years, Korozo has worked with its suppliers to develop material based on alternative raw materials like PLA, Bico, Green PE usage in the product construction or using PIR/PCR at certain levels. Sustainability in raw material supply is also very important and supplying green-PE is not easy due to limited availability of suppliers in the market.

Lycra Introduces Sustainable Fiber

In April 2023, The Lycra Company, a developer of innovative and sustainable fiber and technology solutions for the personal care and apparel industries, launched Lycra EnviroFit fiber, one of the many fibers that the company has developed as part of its Planet Agenda sustainability platform. With its unique chemistry, Lycra EnviroFit fiber utilizes thinner yarns, reducing the amount of fiber per article and helping conserve resources without compromising product performance.

“We are thrilled to introduce Lycra EnviroFit fiber, which reduces fiber weight while maintaining the overall quality and performance that personal care products require,” says Scott Blackadar, president, personal care at The Lycra Company. “Having less mass means fewer resources and less energy are consumed during diaper production. This fiber will appeal to manufacturers who want to significantly reduce their product’s environmental impact and help improve its carbon footprint.”

In addition to continuously improving its range of fibers for personal care products, The Lycra Company also focuses on providing total solutions for the challenges its customers face. The company is offering two unique delivery technologies aimed at improving the spandex unwinding process and improving diaper line productivity. Trio Loop, the latest yarn control system from BTSR International S.p.A., in combination with Matrixcube tension controlled plug-and-play unwinding systems, improves yarn tension control and adds more troubleshooting options to further improve diaper line productivity.

“By offering these delivery technologies, we are demonstrating that we are a trusted and highly valued solution provider in the industry,” says Werner Hopstaken, global director, personal care at The Lycra Company. “We are excited to offer our personal care customers these innovative products by BTSR and Mesdan and encourage them to contact us to learn more.”

Poligof Continues to Expand

Continued investment in new production lines have allowed Poligof to expand its global offerings as well as its reach. In addition to new production plants in India and Russia added in the last six years and its Italian headquarters, the company added a site in San Luis Potosi, Mexico, in early 2022. This plant has allowed Poligof Group to broaden its geographical footprint, creating the base for growth in North and Latin American markets. Looking ahead the company plans to continue to expand its global capacity.

Poligof’s global product offering now includes backsheet films and laminates, available in breathable, non-breathable and  synchro printed varieties as well as a wide portfolio of sustainable products. Sales have benefited from a solid portfolio of sustainable films and laminates including PoliGREEN and PoliBLUE from renewable sources; PoliBIO, biodegradable and compostable according to UNI EN 13432; and PoliECO, which features a minimum of 50% recycled-safe polymers content.

Adding to this, Fabrizio D’Amico, commercial director, of Poligof, says in Europe, recent crises, from the pandemic to raw material shortages to the last energy crunch, in an already mature market, are creating a progressive reduction of players, both absorbent hygiene product (AHP) manufacturers and raw material suppliers. “Some companies have terminated their activities and some others have discontinued their hygiene branch; inflation growth is accelerating this trend. In North America, traditionally dominated by A-brands, private label is growing and new players (some of them coming from Europe) have proven to be competitive thanks to their agile and cost oriented footprint,” he says.

From Poligof’s point of view, the three main needs today from a customer standpoint are cost reduction, sustainable products portfolio and the capacity to adapt to a very volatile economic situation. From the supplier side, D’Amico says this means implementing an agile cost structure, to reduce costs and to be more flexible. Also, a complete portfolio of materials based on renewable sources and/or compostable materials is also a must-have. But, he adds, “the most important value a supplier can offer is an innovation program based on downgauging: with recent raw materials’ unprecedented costs, any single gram weight reduction is a significant saving. This means to propose the same or better product performance with less raw material, a challenge for both any R&D department and for process engineers.”

Poligof focuses its investments and strategic decisions on AHP backsheets, and its technical footprint is fully dedicated to these products. For the same reasons, D’Amico says new sustainable products are tailor made for diapers’ needs. These include fully commercial plant based films and laminates, which represent today one of the main pillars of the company’s sustainable backsheets.

Also, as part of its sustainability efforts, in Italy, Poligof is in the process of installing a tri-cogeneration unit plus solar panels, which will allow the company to be more independent from energy cost fluctuations, significantly improving its green footprint.

Furthermore, two new lines dedicated to ultra-light breathable film for baby diaper backsheets—installed this year in the Mira plant—are meeting demand for lighter weight products in hygiene products.

RKW Offers Broad Range

The RKW Group offers a broad product portfolio of films and nonwovens for hygiene and medical applications through the Hyfol, Aptra, RKW HyCare and Medifol brand names. From one of the thinnest and most complex printed backsheets, textile backsheets as well as film solutions for feminine hygiene, to films for wound care products, RKW produces a wide range of premium hygiene films and diverse nonwovens, as well as a variety of specialty products. With its premium backsheet and topsheet films, RKW serves a global customer base in the areas of baby care, fem care, adult incontinence, as well as numerous customers in the medical field.

For more than 45 years, RKW has been producing high-quality backsheet films and is one of the leading experts in sustainable, safe and comfortable film solutions for baby diapers, feminine hygiene products and discreet and reliable solutions for adult incontinence. The current product portfolio for hygiene products includes both breathable and non-breathable solutions, pouch films, elastic films, nonwovens, laminates and closure system components—including brands such as Hyfol, Aptra and RKW HyCare.

Savaré

Savaré has achieved the Ecovadis Gold rating this year, a significant improvement from last year’s Silver status. This result places Savaré among the top 4% companies in the chemical industry.
The Savaré plant in Cerro Maggiore has also confirmed its ISCC PLUS certification for the second year in a row. ISCC – International Sustainability and Carbon Certification is a global sustainability certification system that enables sustainable, deforestation-free and traceable supply chains of bio-circular raw materials.

“The Ecovadis Gold and ISCC Plus certifications reinforce Savaré’s commitment to bring safe, sustainable solutions to its customers and consumers,” says Pietro Savaré, industry manager.

“As consumers’ environmental consciousness accelerates and brands commit to sustainability ambitions, Savaré continues to work closely with numerous industry partners to enable tangible improvements in the sustainability profile of a wide variety of articles – including hygiene and medical products, mattresses and industrial articles.

“Savaré products also benefit from our uniquely water-free Safemelt patented packaging technology, to drive carbon footprint among the lowest in the industry.

“Last but not least, we are excited to announce that our Cerro Plant, where 100% of our energy is already renewably sourced, will soon benefit from our latest investment in an on-site, green-field solar power installation that shall cover 100% of our daily electrical consumption by 2024—the year of Savaré’s 100th birthday.”

Technical Absorbents Targets Washable Absorbents

With growth in the market for reusable hygiene products outpacing growth of traditional applications, the marketplace for these materials continues to become more crowded with both industry newcomers and industry stalwarts looking to marry the world of textiles and disposables.

A key challenge for makers of washable absorbent products is maintaining absorbency. Superabsorbent fibers producer  Technical Absorbents has been at the forefront of developing superabsorbent washable fabric technology.

SAF washable fabrics provide the same high levels of absorbency as disposable fabrics but can be washed and re-used. Once in a final fabric construction, studies have indicated modest absorbency loss of 20% after 40 wash cycles. They typically range from 190 to 450gsm and are typically a blend of SAF and other synthetic fibers. Anti-microbial, flame retardant and anti-odor finishes can also be added during the manufacturing process.

Recently, Technical Absorbents achieved Oeko-Tex certification for its washable fabric technology.

“With the reusable period and incontinence sector experiencing significant growth, the next step for our superabsorbent washable fabrics was to strive for Oeko-Tex Certification,” explains TAL product development director John Rose.  

TAL expects to introduce further innovation grades for washable products sometime next year. Once integrated within the final product, they provide elevated levels of absorption and retention so that the wearer can go about their daily life with confidence. 
 
“All of our washable fabrics contain the same individual components and so we can now assure our customers that they shouldn’t encounter any issues should they need to get their final products tested. All individual components were evaluated to the Oeko-Tex 100 certification,” Rose adds.

Texol Focuses on Fit, Sustainability

According to Carmine Cimini, chief technology and sustainability officer, Texol/Orma, comfort and skin benefits continue to be the more important factors influencing product design in the hygiene market. The development of single and double formed films with enhanced softness properties as well as special grades of nonwoven materials are able to achieve comfort without sacrificing performance.

“Improvement is part of our daily work, being on the supply chain, on the converting and last but not least on the performance. In Europe we are getting an escalation from different customers about a confirmation for the absence of PFAS (fluorinated substances that contain at least one fully fluorinated methyl or methylene carbon atom) in the material we supply,” he says. “This is requiring huge effort with our resin and fiber supplier and of course also readjusts the supply chain as not necessarily this regulation is applied so strictly in other parts of the world. Nevertheless, we strongly believe that safety of the consumer is also part of our responsibility.”

The integration of Texol and Orma, which began in 2017, has allowed the company offer a range of solutions for the hygiene market including formed film technology, elastic laminates, to elastic films, perforated air through bonded nonwovens and spunlace nonwovens. Additionally, the company is developing  nonwoven substrates with absorbent performance without  plastic components (i.e. plastic free core). “In addition via our focus on sustainability we have the possibility to offer perforated film with green polymer, spunlace with a wide range of artificial and/or natural fibers, being viscose from different source, cotton, hemp, flax and Kapok. This  wide range of material technologies is opening opportunity to support other segment too,” Cimini says,.

Within the feminine care market, Texol is working to formulate materials that can still be considered natural (i.e. by using cotton fibers) while impacting the price only marginally. This is being achieved through the use of a special grade of artificial fibers which have been in textiles and are considered to be very comfortable. Additionally, the use of natural fibers like hemp and flax continues to expand in hygiene product design.