POTATO CRISPS DISPLAY UNIT

Supermarket retailer Tesco (England) gives bags of potato crisps a much higher profile in its UK stores with display units made of sheet of Eastman Chemical Company's Spectar® copolyester. The result was so popular that the supermarket chain ordered 4,000 more units.

Charles Townsend, sales director for Benchmark said that Tesco had a number of needs for the new units so they had to find a material that easily lent itself to secondary fabrication techniques. Townsend explained, "Spectar copolyester was the best material to use for the kind of display unit we designed. It was by far a more favorable material because it was very cost-effective, could be cold-formed and still be hole-punched to allow dividers to be put in with tabs. Moreover, it had modified impact properties."

The Tesco design team had called for a complete wall of potato crisps. Because it was quite large, it also had to have some kind of support. Benchmark designed a metal support using Specter copolyester inside the framework. The overall effect was a wall of crisps 1.2 meter's high.

Ease of assembly on site was also a priority. Townsend said, "Each store gets a kit with a mounting bracket, the display and easy-to-follow instructions." He added, "The new units have replaced a system that Tesco had been using for two years that simply did not work. With the success of the new units, this material will be considered for other display purposes in the future."

For more information, contact Sharon Jones, Eastman Chemical Company, P.O. Box 431, Kingsport, TN 37662-5371, 423-229-2045, Fax: 423-224-0044, E-mail: spectara@eastman.com.