Rigid Containers attains hygiene accreditations for direct contact food packaging

Rigid Containers, part of the VPK Packaging Group and a leading supplier of sustainable corrugated packaging, has attained its first BRC Global Standards Higher Hygiene and The American Institute of Baking (AIB) certification.

The accreditations were earned by the company’s Wellington site, allowing Rigid to further build on its packaging solutions to the food and drink sector and now supply direct contact packaging to manufacturers.

Over half a million pounds was invested by the business in readying the Wellington site for both the BRC and AIB audits, with improvements made to the building, equipment upgrades and enhanced training for staff.

The BRC Global Standard for Food Safety is developed by food industry experts from retailers, manufacturers and food service organisations to ensure it is rigorous and detailed. It provides a framework to manage product safety, integrity, legality and quality, and the operational controls for these criteria in the food manufacturing, processing and packing industry.

For the AIB, manufacturing facilities that are certified must ensure that their contracted third-party packaging material providers and packagers comply with Global Food Safety Initiative packaging requirements.

“It was important for us to not just go for one accreditation but for both as this means customers have complete peace of mind when choosing us for their food packaging requirements,” comments Paul Barber, Group Operations Director & Site Director, Wellington.

“Certification by both bodies provides the highest levels of scrutiny to our processes and is part of our ethos of going ‘above and beyond’ when it comes to quality control and safety.”

www.rigid.co.uk