The aim of this work was to investigate the influence of packaging on measurements of visible-near infrared and near infrared spectroscopy during the shelf life of fresh-cut Valerianella leaves and Golden Delicious apple slices. Principal component analysis and partial least square discriminant analysis were applied on spectral data to reach the objectives. Results on Golden Delicious could be considered satisfactory even if the classification performances were lower than those obtained for Valerianella; however, overall collected positive predictive values ranged from 86.7% to 100.0%. The presence of packaging had only a slight effect on classification capability. These findings would be useful in the development of freshness decay assessment tools using these optical techniques along products' post-packaging chain. (C) 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.