Which is Better, Stand Up Pouch or Plastic Bottle?

Plastic bottles and stand up bags have different advantages. Plastic bottles are more rigid than stand up pouches, more expensive to produce, and are a popular method to package cold drinks. Stand up bags are more flexible, less expensive to produce, and are becoming increasingly popular. Which of the two is better? The question only makes sense in case on some defined criteria. Here are a few criteria on which we can compare plastic bottles and StandUpPouches.net's custom printed stand up pouches:

(1) Production costs

A typical custom printed stand up bag costs between 15 and 20 cents apiece. A plastic bottle costs more than double this amount. This means stand up bags have an advantage here for companies.

(2) Transport and inventory costs

A couple of thousand of these stand up bags can fit inside a large carton. A couple of thousand plastic bottles, depending on what size they are, will at least need a small room. This increases the costs of storage. A consequence of occupying more space is that a business has to pay more to transport plastic bottles from location X to location Y. So stand up bags are a winner here.

(3) Environmental friendliness

It takes more resources to produce a bottle of plastic. A plastic bottle is not recyclable. It occupies more space in a landfill than a plastic pouch, therefore requiring more landfills. It takes a lesser amount of plastic to manufacture a stand up pouch. These pouches are recyclable and are landfill friendly, which means more of these pouches can fit inside a landfill – thus requiring fewer landfills. So stand up pouches are a winner here too.

(4) Usability

On the face of it, a plastic bottle appears to be more user-friendly. It fits inside a knapsack, it is strong, and it doesn't break on falling. On closer look, it is apparent that with accessories like a spout, a stand up pouch becomes as usable as a plastic bottle. It fits inside a bag, and you don't need to have an extra pocket for it. Unlike a plastic bottle, it doesn't puncture or burst on falling. Usability is more of a subjective issue. There are people who find typewriters more usable than modern computers. So let's call it a draw here.

In these four comparisons, three are won by standup pouches, and one was a draw. So we can safely assume that plastic pouches are better than bottles.