Sealed Air Case

Competitor Analysis:

The competitive products in flexible wrap segment are much diversified, for instance cellulose wadding, corrugated products, polyethylene foam, loose fills, uncoated bubbles and competitive coated bubble. Even though Sealed Air’s focus would be uncoated bubble wrap market which serves the flexible wraps segment, competitors are not just Astro (we license our technology to) and GAFCEL, but also paper-based and foam producers who are going after the same customer needs.

One of the features that differentiated AirCap cushioning from all other bubble products is its “barrier coating”. So the barrier-coating and its customer benefits have been the central theme of Sealed Air’s AirCap cushioning selling efforts. Sealed Air’s advantage was the production of coated bubble products for high-end users; the uncoated bubble products are not its strength. Therefore, it will be very critical for Sealed Air to know its competitors very well before the company makes any progress on introducing uncoated bubble products.

For the alternatives:

The impact of loose fills product can be relatively small due to its messy and poor cushioning disadvantage.

Cellulose wadding is much cheaper than AirCap in thin grades, but heavier than AirCap, meaning higher shipping cost. Corrugated products are appreciably cheaper than AirCap on square-foot basis, but have poor cushioning performance; but the labor cost of using corrugated is usually very high. Therefore, uncoated bubble product with lower price can beat these alternatives above.

Jiffy Packaging, Du Pont Microfoam and Sentinel Products are the main foam producers. The advantage: Foam products are cheaper than current AirCap products on square-foot basis. However, the disadvantage: Foam products have poorer cushioning performance than current AirCap products and are more expensive than AirCap in thicker grades. Since Sealed Air will use the similar product strategy Astro uses – making uncoated bubble...