The Future of Retail Packaging Design

During my lunch today I attended Robert Smith's webinar about retail packaging design. Unfortunately my work pulled me away from it a few times so I wasn't able to fully enjoy the webinar, but even without hearing the whole talk, I thought that it was interesting, pertinent and that he offered some great sources for inspiration. When I joined the webinar (oops five minutes late), Smith was telling a story about his parents reaction to one of his projects. He started by saying that his parents like to see his work in the stores and that they had ventured out to find some of his latest projects. When Smith's parents told him about their excursion they also sheepishly admitted that they didn't like the wrestlers on his chip packaging and that they much preferred his more sophisticated work for a different brand. Smith explained to his parents that they didn't need to feel bad since the product was not intended for them. This line of chips was marketed specifically to 20 to 40 year olds and fittingly the packaging his parents liked was targeted to their age demographic. All of this clearly illustrated the importance of knowing your target market to produce the most effective product possible.

Shortly after Smith finished telling this story I was called away to proof a book (the black printed grey again, guess who is looking for a discount!). When I returned he had moved on to how to implement the information you have once you have chosen and researched a demographic. Smith went over a number of different considerations, but one of the things that I had never thought much about was the way that QR codes change the demographic of a product. By putting a QR code onto a package you are assuming that the consumer has a smart phone, has a program to read the codes and that they know how to use both of these technologies. Smith pointed out that because of this necessary knowledge, many consumers will be turned off and will not purchase the product. After all of this, he mentioned that to the target demographic this can be a great feature as easy to read ingredient lists, suggested recipes, and other added bonuses can be linked using the QR code.

At the end of the talk Smith reminded us of a few of his favourite websites (lovelypackage.com and thedieline.com are favourites of mine as well) and gave a list of suggested reading. Embarrassingly I had only heard of one of the books. Following is a list (i.e. my new reading list) of the books he suggested: Box Bottle Bag, Packaging Essentials, I Miss My Pencil, The Art of Packaging Design and Not a Box. I always enjoy these sorts of design talks and will be sure to continue documenting them for your enjoyment and my own future reference.