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Packaging is a subject requiring an intelligent and logical approach, particularly where corrosive metal goods are concerned. In this article the author outlines the considerations that must be made and the processes of elimination that must be gone through to ensure that the best and, at the same time, most economic method of packaging is employed for any particular item. Five factors influencing the selection of the packaging method are summarised at the end.

Since 1970 there has been a distinct drop in the tonnage used for paper wrappings and this is attributed to competition from foils, laminates and plastics materials, particularly for fats and snack foods. The major competitors are, of course, high density polythene and low density polythene, both of which provide the right sort of properties for wrapping fats and fatty foods to such an extent that they have made big inroads on the paper wrapper market.

At its most fundamental, packaging does three major jobs: it preserves, it protects and it identifies. It is frequently the first thing that developing countries use to improve their food situation. Once they introduce better packaging into the system, they can reduce losses that occur, in food distribution in particular, by considerable amounts. As much as 25 or 30% of a crop can be saved by relatively simple improvements in packaging procedures. However, in the sophisticated countries of the world, packaging does a lot more than merely preserve, protect and identify.

In this study, a mode choice model explicitly considering travel time reliability is developed. This model quantifies travelers' attitudes towards travel time variability as well as average travel time. Data were collected from the morning commuters who have two or three alternative modes including some public transportation and private vehicles. The survey period includes both a normal period where all the transportation modes were available and an abnormal period where the main major public transportation service was closed. The model is applied to practical commuters' decision making, and one of the findings in the mode choice model is that they pay relatively large attention to the travel time variability. In this model, travel time variability is dealt with as the possibilities that the commuters arrive before or after their job starting time separately. The best-fit model indicates that the commuters pay more attention to early arrival and less to late arrival in the normal period. In the abnormal period, however, their attention shifts drastically to late arrival. This suggests that the commuters behave optimistically in the normal period and pessimistically in the abnormal period.

Packaging is a strategic tool that merits holistic management. Three managerial disciplines have the potential to significantly influence packaging strategy: marketing, logistics, and ethics. Despite the multidimensional nature of packaging, the academic literature tends to analyse these three dimensions separately. To address this shortcoming of a more integrated approach, the aim of this paper is to identify the main integration areas among marketing, logistics, and ethics in packaging innovation projects, in the retail grocery sector.

In total, 186 cases of packaging design were selected and the data collected were analysed by quantitative content analysis (cross‐tabulation).

The results show that simultaneous integration among marketing, logistics and ethics recurs in only one third of the cases. The main area of integration is between marketing and ethics. To a lesser extent, there is a significant degree of integration between marketing and logistics as well as between logistics and ethics. Nevertheless, the findings of this initial analysis suggest that the potential in terms of integration has yet to be exploited.

Taking a holistic view of innovation in packaging, the study can assist managers participating in packaging management by providing a conceptual instrument for the integrated evaluation of the multidimensional relationships among the three perspectives.

The paper provides the first empirical exploration in this field and an original conceptual framework that could serve as a theoretical reference point for future research and as a managerial tool, recognising the urgent need for a careful understanding of how marketing, logistics and ethics may be integrated in innovation projects.

PLASTICS. BRITAIN'S plastics industry has more than doubled its production during the last five years and now has an annual output of about 320,000 tons. An important stimulant to this growth has been the rapid post‐war expansion of the chemical industry and its concurrent demand for corrosion‐resistant equipment. The plastics industry has not yet produced the ideal plastic which is easy to apply and use and yet has all the durable qualities such as resistance to acids, alkalis, solvents, oxidising agents, etc. It has, however, produced a range of products, each of which has particular qualities which make it attractive to use for particular applications.

PTFE DISPERSIONS. The big drawback to the ‘wonder plastic’ material—polytetrafluoroethylene—is its very high cost, and the very little that is at present being used in the U.K. appears in small moulded parts only. In massive form its use is quite impracticable. PTFE may, however, have applications as a dispersion in metal finishing work, a possibility that was considered by E. M. Elliott of I.C.I. Plastics Division when he presented a paper on this subject at the Conference of the Institute of Metal Finishing.

Perhaps no strategic planning model has generated the controversy that PIMS has. Although some of the critics' charges may be justified, the authors find that the model is still valid and extremely valuable.

WATER SERVICE PROBLEM. An unusual solution was found to a perplexing problem in the water treatment of an air‐conditioning system in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. The system, comprising a 150‐ton compressor‐type comfort cooling system and a 510‐ton Carrier absorption refrigeration unit, installed in offices and plant in June 1955 and June 1956, respectively, is serviced by separate cooling towers. Within three weeks of the 510‐ton unit going into operation, serious operating difficulties, which virtually shut down the air‐conditioning equipment, developed. Water Service Laboratories, who are specialists in water problems, were called in to survey the cooling water problem. Samples of make‐up water from each of the two cooling towers located on the roof of the plant were sent to the laboratories for analysis.

PILGRIM'S PROGRESS. ‘A MINISTRY of metal care or preservation is now as necessary as a Ministry of Supply’ was one of the statements made by Mr. T. Henry Turner, chairman of the Corrosion Group, when he delivered the third chairman's address recently. Entitled ‘A Pilgrim's Progress from Corrosion,’ the address contained a fascinating account of Mr. Turner's personal fight against corrosion and the many fields in which he has met its challenges over a period of 35 years. From early work with sprayed metal coatings and nickel plating to the diverse corrosion problems which confront the chief chemist and metallurgist of a railway company, Mr. Turner has encountered at one time or another most aspects of industrial corrosion. It was he who during the last war suggested the use of modern boiler‐water treatment, with inhibitors to prevent boiler corrosion and to avoid descaling, which was subsequently adopted by the Royal Navy and the Merchant Navy. He was the first to have stainless‐steel components made for his bicycle and claims that his 1926 motor car was the first in the country to have its bumpers specially chromium‐plated on a heavy undercoating of nickel. The introduction of mirror‐polished stainless‐steel knives had, according to his records, reduced the number of sharpenings necessary over a period of seven years from about 7,000 to 14.