Does your packaging design have good shelf presence?
Today’s retail environment is oversaturated with an endless variety of products, making it difficult for individual brands to stand out. That’s why it is more important than ever for your product’s packaging design to have a great shelf presence to cut through the clutter and grab your consumer’s attention.
One of our biggest passions is packaging design and bringing new products to market. With more than 20 years of package design experience and first-hand knowledge of the retail industry, we offer a wide range of design and strategy services to launch your product and fuel its success. From sketches to full-scale mockups, color studies and product renderings, no project is too big or too small. We also have extensive experience working within the food and beverage industry, which has its own set of unique challenges.
Before beginning any packaging project, we like to spend some time exploring the health of the company’s brand. While beautiful packaging can be used to improve your brand’s impression with consumers, if a strong brand identity does not already exist, it will be much harder to motivate shoppers to purchase the product and ultimately be loyal to the product. Click here to learn more about the brand strategy services we provide.
Packaging Design Considerations
When we take on a packaging project, we aren’t just thinking about the final box, bag or bottle. There are several elements that should be considered for a successful product launch or re-design. To make them easier to digest, we’ll call them the seven P’s.
Product
The merchandise that the consumer is purchasing and the formula, pieces or ingredients that make it. This is what will be contained in the packaging. Have an idea for a new product and need help bringing your vision to life? We have experience launching products and taking them to market. Let’s chat!
Package
This is what the product is contained in. The packaging includes the overall type or structure of the vessel (box, bottle, pouch, etc.), design elements and written content. Not sure what kind of vessel you need? We can help!
Pieces
If this product is one of several in a family or system, how can we create connectivity and cohesion across segments and categories? Or, should this particular product look and feel totally different? Our work for Salacia Salts is a great example of designing across several families of products.
Position
How the product is different (or similar) from others in the market. Where will you fit into your market, and how closely will you follow existing rules / norms? This is where our brand strategy services are so useful. We can examine your target market, see what your competitors are doing, and make recommendations accordingly.
Purchaser
Who are your ideal customers and what are they looking for? It’s crucial to identify and analyze your target audience, their demographics, and their buying habits. A few questions to ask are: How does your target market shop? What are their common interests? What benefits does your product offer them?
Price
How much the product costs your consumers. Consider how much you should be spending on the product, labor and packaging materials per unit in order to make a profit. Don’t forget to include shipping costs! Research your market and price your product accordingly. Also, think about the possibility of wholesale pricing now rather than later.
Promotion
How the product is presented in the market to attract consumers. Sales, point-of-purchase displays and in-store signage are all examples of ways to encourage initial purchase and eventually consumer loyalty. We can design and manage the production of all your signage and display pieces.
Packaging Design Process
Our design process has been honed over several years of experience – both through working with our clients as well as our first hand knowledge of the retail industry.
Analysis
This part of the package design process is arguably the most important. In this stage we research and analyze your brand, where it fits in the market, and its competitors. We also need to clarify the goals of the project. Are you launching a brand new product, do you need to redesign your packaging so that you make more money, or are you adding a new product to an existing family of products? We ask WHY a lot before we get to the HOW.
Ideation
Once we’re familiar with your goals and our objective, we start ideating. During the ideation stage, we hold internal brainstorming sessions, do lots of sketching, create moodboards, and explore a wide range of design concepts. We’ll refine later – right now we’re concerned with getting everything out of our brains and onto paper. When applicable, we take into consideration any current brand collateral to ensure that the packaging reinforces your brand.
Evaluation & Refinement
A beautiful design is completely useless if it doesn’t work, is out of your budget, or doesn’t help you achieve the goals you’ve established. Full-scale mockups and prototypes ensure that our designs are viable. When we do this, we can see if something is folding incorrectly, if the material chosen is sturdy enough to hold the product, etc. This stage usually happens in many phases. We go back to the drawing board, and back again until it works.
Production
Once our team and the client are confident in our design and how it functions, we prepare the print ready artwork and send to our vendor. We maintain close relationships with our printers and oversee the printing process to ensure quality and accuracy. This phase sometimes involves a hard copy proof so that we can review color and other design elements before the final product is produced.
Follow Up
Once a new product hits shelves, we start evaluating sales. We can work on campaigns to promote the product, leveraging its stories, content and features. We set milestones to follow up and see how the packaging has been received, how sales are going, and make recommendations for adjustments based on consumer response. Our goal is use our skills in packaging design and marketing to help accelerate your business and sell more product to the right customer.
