Designers have two key tools to grab the consumers’ attention, graphics and structure.
Packaging graphics must do more than simply look pretty. They must work to cut through the white noise that is the crowded supermarket shelf, and attract a potential buyer. Once they attract a buyer's attention, packs don't stop working. Designers have to make sure they convey information, about how much they and their contents cost to buy, the ingredients they contain, and whether or not they can be recycled.
Packaging is also the medium many businesses exploit to convey their brand.
The term ‘brand’ originates from the days when farmers used to brand their cattle to register ownership of their herd. Before long the brand began to represent not just the owner but their values and quality of their product; it became a mark of security and trust. Packaging has always had a fundamental role to play in the way brands communicate these values. From these relatively humble beginnings packaging design in the modern age has become one of the most sophisticated, holistic and powerful examples of the designer’s craft. The full life cycle of packaging now touches on all of the key issues facing business today and it is important to understand its impact from cradle to grave. From where the original product is sourced and the cost of materials used, to the transportation costs to store and the legacy issues surrounding its reuse or disposal designers today must consider the full impact of a pack’s design. Jonathan Sands, Designer, Elmwood
Colour
The first thing you remember about a brand may well be its colour. Think Cadbury's Dairy Milk purple, Coca-Cola's red or Guinness's black and cream. Colour makes your product recognisable and its important that any packaging designer's response to a brief conveys understanding on what the colours they use will convey, and whether they are going to sit with or challenge convention.
Sometimes the most-effective packs are the most simple. Multiple colours on a pack can be both distracting to the customer and costly to produce, which is why colour rationalisation is becoming increasingly popular.
Chapter 1
Branding and design group LFH has developed a patented colour rationalisation technology, Chapter 1, which it believes could save brands as much as £5,500 per SKU (stock-keeping unit). The technology aims to help brand owners rationalise the number of colours they use when printing packaging for all their products. By rationalising the colour selection to just six this can reduce downtime on the print and production line and allow simultaneous printing of a range of packs. The economy of scale efficiencies offered by Chapter 1 appealed to Unilever, which has adopted the process and called it Rainbow. Cutting the number of colours used in packaging production has been described as a recession busting strategy for major brand owners such as Unilever because it has the potential to cut the number of colours they use from the current 100+ to six or seven. Unilever uses Rainbow over 400 SKUs, on brands such as Flora and Hellmans, without a reduction in quality.Designers must also consider how the branding will work across different mediums. The design arena is becoming ever more concentrated and the impact of print and television campaigns should also be a key consideration in the design process.
Story
Building a story into the packaging of a product is becoming increasingly popular way to convey provenance and brand essence. Doing so allows consumers to connect with the product on an emotional level.
Debbie & Andrew’s
Premium sausage brand Debbie & Andrew's has successfully been able to build a strong back-story into its brand via its packaging design. Sales of its sausages increased 100.7% in 2008 after design agency Elmwood overhauled its packaging and helped the Yorkshire-based sausage company tell customers about it's history and ethos. The front of the packs display pictures of the couple's wellies to show the product comes fresh from their farm, and on the back there is a profile and picture of Debbie and Andrew which helps consumers connect with the brand on an emotional level.
Cultural issues
When designing for different cultures, language, colour, texture, and sensitivity to visual imagery have to be considered. For instance, in some countries picturse animals on packs are consider unlucky or disrespectful.
Brahma beer
Birmingham-based design agency Boxer had to consider how different cultures would respond when it helped Brazilian beer Brahma move into different markets. “A market leader in Brazil, we successfully addressed the cultural differences of how Brazil’s number one beer was used and celebrated in Brazil and compared this with our knowledge of the cultural differences in the UK market where a greater standout and greater celebration was expected of the product,” said Boxer business development director Julian Glyn-Owen.
Illustration
When designing pictures onto a piece of packaging, the feel and tone of illustration and photography should be clearly outlined in the brief from the brand.
Practical considerations like the printing process and substrate onto which the image is going to be printed will also affect how illustrations or photographs are designed onto a pack.
McDonald’s
McDonald’s scope spans 58 million customers a day, 31,000 restaurants across 118 countries. Boxer was required to manage the redesign of the fast food chain’s packaging. Food photography was a key part of this process and so the agency had to clearly brief photographers as to the exact mood they were looking for in the shots. Boxer won bronze at the 2008 DBA awards in the design management category for its work with McDonald’s.
Matt Leese, Director of colour management film Tag, believes it is important to engage consumers "through many channels with one clear message". He explains using the Apple example:
Though the example is used to death – Apple products embody this view perfectly. Jonathan Ive, their product designer, has as much of a handle on the packaging as the products. One could almost say that the packaging forms part of the product. The campaigns are entirely product led and therefore shows a great joined up story. Matt Leese, Tag