Why does oatmeal come in a round box?

Factual Questions
21

Packing factor. Rectangular boxes can be pressed up against each other with no appreciable gaps between the edges. No wasted space. Round cylinders have dead space in the interstices between the round bits.

Here is the 3-D version using spheres. 2-D has similar packing factor.

Imagine a square grid of circles, aligned in columns and rows. If all the circles are in straight columns and rows, you get lots of gap between the curves.


 
OOOOOO
OOOOOO
OOOOOO

Now look at the “honeycomb” pattern, where the second row is offset by half a diameter, so it fits into the gap between the two above it in the first row. (I can’t indent a half-space, but I think this suggests the idea.)


 
OOOOOO
 OOOOOO
OOOOOO

Tighter packing factor, still some dead space.

Here is a discussion of circle packing. Scroll down to the pretty pictures. See the one labeled “Square”? That is the first example above. Look at the yellow compared to black. Now look at the one labeled “Triangular”. Notice how there is less yellow, less wasted space. That is the physical demonstration of packing factor, i.e. measure of wasted space.

Rectangles of consistent size are much more efficient than round things.

22

Cereal boxes often come with the disclaimer “some settling may have occurred during transportation” or the like. This is because the packaging has to take into consideration the volume of a loose packing of the cereal within the box and the settling that occurs during handling.

All of those little cereal bits are knobby, bumpy, odd-shaped bits of various sizes. When being handled at the factory and placed into packaging, the are typically poured from a hopper or whatnot into the top of the package. This means all those odd bits come together in random arrangements, which makes for a loose packing factor. There is a reasonably consistent range of volume that will fill for a certain weight of product. The packaging has to accommodate this loosest packing factor fit to sell by weight.

During handling, i.e. transportation from along the assembly line, into trucks, transported to stores, loaded on shelfs, into carts, past the checker, through your car, to your shelf, and eventually your table, there is a lot of shaking going on. Shaking has the effect of sorting the bits to more efficient packing shapes. In other words, loose bits move around, smaller pieces settle through larger ones, shapes wiggle and shift and move into empty spaces created during the loose fill process.

When you open the box, excess volume air has moved to the top of the box as all the pieces of cereal are more tightly packed in the box. That is settling, which makes it look like they shipped you a half-empty box. They did, but that gap was spread around in the box when they filled it. You bought the weight of product they told you you were getting. And some air from handling.

Plus, open the lid, if the package is not sufficiently rigid, there may be bowing of the box sides, letting the product settle a bit lower.

Incidentally, chips often come with extra [del]air[/del] nitrogen in their bags on purpose - that space and nitrogen serves to cushion the chips so they to not get as squashed during handling. The internal pressure keeps the bag inflated like a balloon, rather than getting flattened.

23

I always thought it was so we could make a drum out of it when the oatmeal was gone…

24

Why doesn’t anything come in hexagonal packaging?

25

Koala’s March cookies in Japan. They’re sold as Koala Yummies in the US, where they’re also in hexagonal packages.

26

Some boxed wine is hexagonal.

27

Honey?

28

Damn you and your ninja post!! :slight_smile:

29

Don’t recall the brands offhand, but some jams and marmalades come in hexagonal jars.

30

I’ve seen jam jars that are octagonal. No way to avoid wasted space with those (you’re left with small open squares in the middle and open triangles around the edge), but they do fill space a bit more efficiently than round jars.

31

When I was little, first grade, our school milk came in paper cartons that were pyramid shaped.

32

What else would they be cut with, cheap plastic utensils?

33

Ooh! I got this one in a job interview! It’s so the lid doesn’t fall into the box.

Mexican chocolate.

34

Had to go look upthread to see the reference.

When oats are harvested, they are in hulled shells and are round. Processing begins by removing the hulls, and separating the oats and oat pieces by size. Some of the oat groats (i.e. unprocessed oat seeds) are broken during the handling.

Later, whole oats can be cut to make more of the smaller oat pieces. Any oat pieces of varying sizes, whether deliberately cut or broken during the handling process, are called “steel cut”.

The whole oats and sized oat pieces are then processed by either rolling to make flakes (rolled oats), or ground to make flour (after separating the bran). Apparently the different sizes and thickness of oat flakes are marketed and used separately.