When it comes to tasty street food, it’s often easy to overlook its packaging. Yet streetfood packaging plays a vital role in the consumer’s experience and memory of the food.
Choosing the Right Containers:
It is important to choose the right containers for the food you will be serving. If you are selling burgers, clamshell-style boxes are the best choice. In contrast, if you are using cookie packaging (Such as a paper bag) to sell Ramen Noodles, your customers will not be happy.
Food Products, and their appropriate packaging:
Tacos and Nachos:
Both Tacos and Nachos can be messy foods to eat. To package them, a cardboard food tray lined with leak proof grease-resistant paper is a good idea.
Burgers:
There are lots of packaging options for burgers. Clamshell boxes are very popular and are often favoured by consumers. However, it isn’t uncommon for burgers to be served wrapped in kraft, or greaseproof paper. Sometimes, burgers are served with simply a napkin, or no packaging at all!
Sandwiches :
A popular food takeaway container for a sandwich is a deli box. Deli Boxes are very popular for both hot and cold food.
They are commonly made from cardboard and fold closed at the top. However, they sometimes have a plastic “Window” on top, to show the contents inside. Deli boxes are very popular takeaway food boxes.
Burritos:
We all love a burrito! Burritos commonly have the most simplistic packaging of all – they’re usually wrapped in foil!
Doughnuts and Cookies:
Doughnuts and cookies are commonly packaged in paper food trays or paper bags.
Hot Dogs:
Hot dogs are often packaged in a cardboard sleeves.
Fish, Chips and Curry Sauce:
Fish and Chips as street food are often served in polystyrene or cardboard food packaging.
Though traditionally, fish and chips were wrapped in old newspapers, which was one of the most sustainable takeaway packaging methods!
Modern Polysteryne or cardboard packaging is either open-topped or close topped. Alongside fish and chips, it’s common to supply disposable cutlery too, such as a wooden chip fork.
Sauces are often packaged in plastic or polystyrene tubs with a lid, this is perfect for dunking!
Loaded or Halloumi Fries:
Loaded Fries use similar takeaway packaging to Fish and Chips, although this is usually open topped and lined with grease resistant paper.
Ramen Noodles:
Ramen is almost always sold packaged in disposable bowls for hot food! These bowls usually have a PE inner coating to stop the soup from leaking out. Ramen noodles often also include disposable cutlery so they can be eaten conveniently.
Pizza:
Pizza boxes are often made from corrugated cardboard. Pizza boxes are one of the more common bespoke food packaging options.
Ensure Food Safety
For every food vendor, the safety of the food being served is the most important thing. It’s important to make sure that all food and drink packaging is certified for food contact. For more information on food safety, we recommend the Food Standards Agency website.
Getting your brand out there
Bespoke printed food packaging is one of the best ways to get your brand out there! Whilst branded packaging has always been important for brand recognition, with the rise of websites such as Instagram, branded food packaging can seriously elevate your marketing.
Millions of consumers now not only enjoy your food, but they take photos and videos of tasty-looking, well-presented foods! These photos are often posted to Instagram and TikTok. Every time your customer takes a photo with your printed packaging, they are giving you free advertising to thousands of people.
The best presentation
Following on from above, packaging can play a vital role in the presentation of your food. Great presentation not only makes the food appealing to the customer, but makes them want to take photos and share it online.
Eco-Friendly Packaging Swaps
With growing global awareness of climate change, and the effect of single-use packaging on the environment, there have been lots of developments in environmentally friendly food packaging options.
Compostable street food packaging made from sugarcane or bioplastics is very popular in place of plastic sandwich cartons, or sauce containers.
Recyclable Kraft food boxes are usually curbside recyclable and have the added benefit of adding aesthetic appeal to the food. Recyclable food packaging is a very important switch to make, as street food packaging is intended to be single use.
Switching plastic bags to paper carrier bags is a very easy switch to make also. Paper bags can easily be branded to your requirements, and are very popular with consumers. Another great plastic swap is plastic cutlery and straws. Many companies such as M&S have completely switched their takeaway cutlery to wooden cutlery!
What to avoid
For the safety and hygiene of food, the food packaging you choose must be rated for food use.
To be eco-friendly – it’s good to avoid single-use, non-recyclable plastics such as polystyrene.
