Retailers are always looking for a more cost effective way to package products to ship and sell in stores, and one of the methods of packaging products that is not new, but has recently seen a dramatic incline in popularity is paperboard packaging. Paperboard packaging is a way that retailers have been able to take products that would normally be difficult to package, or would waste a lot of plastic or other materials when attempting to package the item, and package the item in a much more space effective container at a much lower price. Paperboard packaging is used most often to make cartons or other forms of packages for materials and products, and recent trends have shown that the packaging itself, rather than the wide variety of graphics on the packing, has been developing into a more innovative shape.

Paperboard is usually a folded package that starts as a flat surface and is folded into a carton to house a product or item, but recently retailers have begun using the smallest paperboard cartons that they possibly can for more than one reason. The first reason is that the smaller packages are much more space effective and allow retailers to keep more items on the shelves, rather than having large paperboard packing for products that takes up a lot of space. Recently, many manufacturers and retailers of a variety of other products have begun using recycled cardboard that is completely uncoated. This is not only a cost effective way that retailers have found to use paperboard packaging, but this also limits environmental impact. The movement that brought this about this change was gradual, but in 2014, there is an influx of companies taking this approach.

As for the most common companies and services to use paperboard, there are a wide variety. The top six types of manufacturers and retailers that use paperboard packaging are retailers who sell the following: medical supplies, milk cartons, juice cartons, cosmetic/perfume supplies, frozen food, and candy boxes. Most of these types of retailers are using solid bleached sulfate paperboard boxes – the paperboard that is coated and bleached is best for these materials – but the manufacturers of paperboard boxes are always looking to make paperboard packaging more cost effective and eco-friendly.