You deserve the best shipping experience possible when you place an order. If you order frozen goods, you might worry about how your products will arrive on your doorstep. Compare the best ways to ship frozen products to ensure your preferred brands mail your orders safely.
Most Common Challenges of Shipping Frozen Products
When you buy a frozen product from a local store, you only have to worry about getting home before it melts. Goods that must stay frozen for a day or longer face more potential complications.
Changing Humidity Levels
Any company determining the best way to ship frozen products must consider how they’ll protect their goods from humidity. When shipment centers and trucks reach around 70%-80% interior humidity levels, mold is more likely to grow within containers seeping with condensation. It makes food products rot faster and ruins the quality of other frozen goods like medications.
Fluctuating Interior Temperatures
It’s easy to maintain the interior temperature of a building like a manufacturing facility. It’s much more challenging to keep frozen goods at the same chilly temperature when passing through trucks and warehouses on their way to your doorstep.
Any brand selling frozen products has to consider changing temperatures when determining how they’ll pack their goods and how deeply they should freeze each order. Deeper freezes mean the products will stay frozen longer if they encounter short periods of warmer temperatures.
Punctured Shipping Materials
Even the most influential companies can’t stop accidents from happening en route to a consumer’s house. Shipping teams sometimes drop boxes or topple the goods in their trucks by stopping suddenly. If a frozen product’s box tears due to these events, it immediately exposes your order to higher temperatures, extra humidity and any airborne contaminants around it. Frozen goods need sturdy shipping materials to keep your order from getting contaminated if these things happen.
Best Options for Shipping Frozen Goods
While you’re comparing brands who sell frozen products you want, check out their shipping options. Browsing the materials they use to keep their goods cold might make your purchasing decision much easier.
Dry Ice
Dry ice is a solid version of carbon dioxide that’s so cold it burns your skin if you touch it without gloves. It’s an effective way to ship frozen goods because they are well below freezing. However, it can also be too cold for some products more sensitive to temperatures below zero.
If you order something and it arrives packed in dry ice, don’t worry. Place the box in a ventilated area, like on your back porch. Use a pair of winter gloves to remove your products safely. The carbon dioxide gas will dissipate into the atmosphere and your hands will remain safe as long as you keep your gloves on.
Leave the rest of the dry ice inside its shipping container in the ventilated area until each piece turns into smoke and drifts away. It may require leaving your box outside overnight or for a full day.
Gel Packs
Shipping companies also offer gel packs as secure ways to transport frozen goods. They contain deep-freeze chemicals within puncture-resistant, leak-proof packaging. They’re great for temperature-sensitive products and shipping containers of all sizes.
Additionally, some gel packs are 100% drain-safe and even feed local plants if they reach the environment through waterways. Just look for environmentally friendly labels on gel pack shipping options for your upcoming purchases.
Wet Ice
Some brands may prefer to ship their products with traditional ice. It’s cost-effective and potentially more familiar to consumers. Shipping companies have different requirements for boxes with wet ice because of the likelihood that it melts and risks the package’s structural integrity.
Due to ice’s higher melting point than dry ice or gel packs, it typically requires more robust refrigerated trucks and faster delivery times. You might not see this as the go-to packaging for frozen products, but it’s another option for shipping frozen goods on a budget.
Deep Freeze Services
Some frozen goods require extreme frozen temperatures. If you’re ordering medication or another chemical-based product, they may need a freezing point well below 32 degrees Fahrenheit to maintain their efficacy.
Shipping companies offer deep freeze options for brands selling these types of products. They fill a box with liquid nitrogen dry vapors to plunge the goods hundreds of degrees below zero. It’s best for orders that need a week or longer to reach each consumer. You might only have this shipping material option if you’re ordering a frozen product from a company in another country.
Find the Best Way to Ship Frozen Products
Once you’ve learned the best ways to ship frozen goods, you’ll know what to look for when ordering cold products. If you compare each brand’s shipping methods and packing materials, you’ll know which company’s goods will likely remain safe and frozen throughout their journey to your doorstep.
Comments are closed.