Product packaging insights

How to Get Started With Retail Product Packaging

We all know packaging is the thing that looks easy, and is horribly difficult, however it doesn’t always have to be.
 A great place to start to develop your first packaging is with the help of your competition.

To begin, don’t think of your competition as the evil dark force, but a bunch of people who accidentally spend their entire time thinking up ideas for you to reference as you develop your business (this applies to EVERYTHING). In this case, we’re looking specifically at packaging.

First of all make a note of the top three competitors (at LEAST) hopefully there are much more than that you can look at. Then, buy their product (don’t open it till you get home!!)

What you want to figure out is:
• how much your competition is spending on their packaging,
• how they are constructing their packaging, how they are protecting their product,
• what kind of ‘look’ your competitors are portraying,
• they are merchandising their product.

These tips are great clues as to what the good and bad of your product sector will bring you.

To begin, bring home that competitor packaging you got and take pictures from every angle before opening them. Also measure the size of the external packaging (be kind and take the measurements in inches and mm not every place uses either and you want to bring them good information from the start.

Next VERY CAREFULLY (did I make that bold enough?) open the packaging. You want to see all the very little things that they use to package the product. Lay the packaging flat or however it is finished (if it’s vacuum formed, yes, it will not go flat for you.) Take more pictures and measurements. You want to get all this info straight to your manufacturers (see the next step).

How much are they spending? This seems like a pretty complex question, but it’s nowhere near that bad. First break down what kind of packaging your competition has, think about it in terms of the manufacturer and what they’ll be charging for something like that. The easiest go around there is to have a design exactly like that quoted at your favorite packaging house and see what they charge for that. Most of them will be rather forthcoming as they’d like your business and want to work with you, asking a few questions is OK, as it’ll give them an idea what you’re looking into and get you a better ballpark number of what they can generate.

Also, don’t just bring them 5 different styles and expect them to give you an exact answer on each (that’s a bit ridiculous) but if you have 2 styles similar to what you want to do and can show what you’re trying to do, they should be pretty helpful (remember, they want your business). Also remember, if they’ve helped you a ton, have reasonable prices, and want to work with you, it would probably be a good choice to work with those nice people! This will show you how the packaging is constructed and get you a ballpark on price to help you decide what to do. You should also have noted their product protection plan upon deconstruction.

Using this information you can weigh cost, design styles, and product protection to get you a good idea of how to package your product.

Will your product be store displayed in the same way as the competition?

Just like any manufacturing, cost reduces with volume. And there will be expenses for:
design
set up for each run of their machine
and usually tooling – cutting dies for the cardboard
assembly for any hand work, like zip tying the product to the backer.

You have to ask how much of the job will be done (all parts made) in one place? 
How much will multiple shipping costs add to the project.

And Very Important, how many packaged products will fit into a standard and popular sized carton?
Will the cartons neatly stack on a standard pallet?
What gage thickness of the carton will be needed to meet Amazon and other wholesaler standards and drop testing?

Is the packing company you want near the fulfillment-distribution warehouse you also want?
If there are 2,000 packages on your pallet and you can save 2 ounces on packaging of each product on a pallet and some on the carton and carton padding, you have reduced the weight of a pallet load by close to 200 pounds: freight savings.
 
Research the Retail Package Association and the Retail Packaging trade shows. Some are category specific, like cosmetics and frozen foods. Watch the many packaging related video channels on YouTube: EYE Opening and Jaw dropping!

Author - Fred Schechter, author and speaker about packaging and product design.
Find him on many web platforms.
Fred’s original article was a blog post on Karen Waksman’s sites, RetailMBA.com and Inventions.org
See her content is on many other sites as an author, and guest presenter for national and international organizations and associations.
Including YouTube

Shared by:
Pointer Consulting
David Bruce Savage ♦ Founder and leader of Inventor’s Education Forum in Jacksonville Florida   

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From my varied work and personal experiences, as well as my leadership of two inventor’s education groups, I provide advice for saving time, money and frustration for inventors, product developers. And I’ll point out the devilish and challenging details that others often avoid sharing.

Whether you are just exploring the viability of your ideas or have products on the market it will be well worth your while to spend some time with me.  Dave