Brown Bag Blog Series Pt. 4: Using Sachet Bags with 3 & 4 Side Seals

A Quick Recap: the Rovema Brown Bag Blog Series

If you’ve been following along with this series for the past few months, you might want to skip this first section! It’s a recap for our new folks joining today. If you’re reading this series for the first time, WELCOME. We’re glad you’re here. 

This is part 4 of our Brown Bag Blog Series dedicated to unpacking (pun intended! 😃) various bag style options for your Rovema vertical form fill seal machine. These posts, like brown bag webinars or in-person meetings, are designed to be short, sweet, and to the point. 

From our many years of experience, we know that you should take the time to carefully consider which bag style best fits your product’s needs. However, we’ve often seen throughout the industry that these VFFS bag styles are often chosen by default or given little thought.

Thinking through the strengths and considerations of different bag styles pays off greatly in the long run. 

As such, we’re releasing these posts to give you a quick overview of the various bag style options for your Rovema VFFS machine. In each, we outline the advantages and considerations of a given bag style, talk about its appearance and how it is formed, and discuss its place within current market trends. 

If you’re new to this series and interested in the other bag styles we’ve explored, you can find ‘em here: 

1. Block Bottom Bags
2. Gusseted Pillow Bags 
3. Flex Can Stand Up Pouches 

Once you’re caught up, read on for our exploration of unique ways to use Sachet Style Packages. 

Want a more in-depth dive? Check out our Comprehensive Bag Style Guide!

A quick side note before we jump into this month’s bag style: the blog posts in this series are a great starting point for finding the right bag style for your Rovema VFFS machine. However, if you’re looking for a more in-depth analysis, be sure to check out our Rovema Bag Style Guide. 

Sachets: Great for Marketing, Great for Efficiency 

Sachet Style Bags are lay flat packages with either 3 or 4 seals. These packages are economical to produce on vertical form fill and seal machines and have a high amount of print area on both the front and back panels (making them a win in most marketing teams’ books).

3 side seal bags can often be produced at high production speeds, and they are especially ideal for products distributed in small quantities where accuracy is especially important. 

Though traditionally made on Horizontal Form Fill Seal baggers or multi-lane sachet machines, they are also an option for your Rovema VFFS machine. The major benefit to running sachets on VFFS vs HFFS? They have a way smaller footprint.  

What is the design of a 3 side seal and 4 side seal Bag?

The Sachet Style Bag is a lay flat package with a top seal and two side seals. It also has an optional fourth seal that can be added for premium design purposes. 

Because of its design, the Sachet Style Bag is well-loved by marketing teams: it has a very high ratio of print area on both the front and back panels, unobscured by seals or seams. 

What are the advantages of a Sachet Style Bag? 

As mentioned above, the Sachet Style Bag is dreamy for marketing teams because of the large panels on which they can print graphics, copy, and other required information. Sachet Style Bags are also simple and economical to make, and it is easy to achieve high production speeds with them on your Rovema VFFS machine.

This bag style is great for smaller product amounts where accuracy is important, and they can easily be customized to include hole punches and easy open and reclosable features. 

What are considerations for Sachet Packaging? 

When choosing which bag style to use for your Rovema VFFS bagger, it is important to think through both the strengths and considerations of a given bag style. A few questions you might want to ask yourself if you are considering a Sachet Style Bag are: 

1. Do I need a pouch that has stand up ability? Since the Sachet Style Bag is not a stand up pouch, you might want to consider Block Bottom Bags, Flex Can Packages, or another style of stand up package. 
2. Am I comfortable with a high packaging material to product ratio? To achieve the full front and back panel design, the Sachet Style Bag does have a higher packaging material to product ratio than other VFFS bag styles. 
3. Do I need to package large quantities of my product? The Sachet Style Bag is usually more well-suited for smaller amounts of product. 

If you have more specific questions or want to talk through bag styles for a specific product or project, hit us up here! 

What types of products would a 3 side seal and 4 side seal bag be good for? 

For the reasons we explored above, many industries utilize the sachet style bag for their products. Companies using a ROVEMA VFFS machine as their 3 side seal pouch making machine to package the following, among other, products: 

• Snacking and Bakery Items
• Beef Jerky (sachet style bags are the industry go-to) 
• Pharmaceutical powders
• Nutraceutical powders
• Salts, spices, and seasonings
• Dehydrated soups, gravy, and other mixes
• Seeds and Nuts

We’re here to help! Let’s work together to find a bag style that works best for your Rovema VFFS bagger. 

In our first blog post in this series, we talked about our “why” for these posts.

Through our many years of experience in the industry, we’ve seen what can happen when customers fail to consider different bag styles and default to one without thinking about their product’s unique needs. 

We also know that choosing the correct bag style is a significant undertaking, and we’re happy to help. Whether you’re thinking the Sachet Style bag would be a good fit, or you’re leaning towards one of the many other bag style options available to you, we are here to support you throughout your decision-making process.