Key Trends that Are Defining the Future of the Packaging Industry

The Packaging Industry always has and will continue to be in great pressure arising out of the increasing expectations kept from customers and the growing need for conserving energy during the production of the packaging material. With continual developments being witnessed in technology, the need for enhancing the existing packaging designs and materials is quintessential in order to keep up with the changing trends. Over the past few years, there has also been a significant increase in preference towards sustainable packaging. With developments being made progressively and innovative ideas flooding the market, the future holds good prospects for a new approach to packaging. The following trends are defining the future of the packaging industry.

Packaging is being carried out in close proximity to the manufacturing plants so that fewer empty Storage Boxes are carried in transport vehicles. From a cost benefit perspective, this has managed to save up not only on fuel charges but has also eliminated excessive timelines that are usually incurred in during transportation of materials / products.

Smart Packaging has been incorporated into packaging designs with technologies such as RFID and other electronic components reducing the need for manual management and monitoring of stocks. Moreover, it has also made it fairly convenient for the products to be tracked and procured and this has reduced the storage / retrieval time considerably.

There is a significant amount of emphasis on reducing the amount of composite material used in a packaging design. The focus is now being made on the use of simple, light-weight, thinner and stronger materials that are able to provide similar or higher packaging quality without the need for extra resources. From a green perspective, this also helps to encourage optimal utilization of available resources.

Packaging professionals are also looking at maximizing space utilization which would prove to be a major advantage during storage and transportation. This requires the design to be modified so that the maximum number of units are stored in it with minimal space. Basic shapes such as squares are being considered to provide a more uniform packaging compilation facility. However, this depends on the nature and type of primary package that is used for the products.

Biodegradable is the new material of choice for packaging designs. Since we have grown so accustomed to using plastic as packaging material, the best to way to contribute to environmental safety is to use biodegradable materials such as plastic derived from starch. This way, even if the material is disposed post usage, it would simple degrade without causing any harm to the environment.

Tips on Successful Packaging Design

Imagine yourself walking down the lane in a shopping store and you suddenly get a glimpse of a product lying amongst others in the section. Even though it was but a glimpse, you walk towards it and check out the Packaging. It seems to interest you. Slowly your mind is making a decision on buying it even if you never intended on getting it when you walked in through the doors. This is the impact that a good package design is able to make on customers. You can lure even the most uninterested person into trying out your product. If you are still stuck with low performing products that just adorn the display racks, then these tips will help you make your products into sensational offerings.

Know Thy Audience!

Products are meant for customers. This means that every aspect of the product, from its usage to its package design should be able to fulfil their needs. Just like product analysis is important to understand the consumer segment being targeted, you should make sure that packaging designs are conform to popular requirements relevant with the demographics of the targeted user group.

Cut the Crap

People do not give much attention to loads of information, especially those which have applied or relevant benefits. It is best to stick to the actual direct benefits that are provided by the product. Moreover, this is an age old marketing strategy that has been tried by every brand in the market. Its time you started thinking beyond conventional boundaries and just state the bare facts.

Keep Multiple Design Options

Restricting yourself to a single package design would only limit your opportunities. Instead, get your hands on a couple of creative and useful designs as a contingent measure. Testing so many designs in real life implementations would be a tad bit risky. So get opinions from your friends and family and analyse their perspectives. After all, they are consumers too.

Keep the Design Relevant to Your Product’s Price

Package design is an important aspect of the product, but under no condition does it ever require that you over-emphasize your product’s worth with over the top flashy presentations. There is a reason why people chose to believe that the package denotes a product’s value. If you put an expensive product in a simple package, consumers would be put off by the lack of concern shown towards the product’s value. Subsequently, if you place a simple product in a premium package, then it would mean that the brand has made an attempt to exaggerate the value of its product and has not delivered as per expectations. It is best if the package design be kept in relevance to the product’s worth.

Check Out Your Competition

It pays to stay a step ahead of your competitors. Evaluate the strategies and package designs being used by other products in your segment. If you simply go along with the trend, then you would only be creating excessive competition with no distinguishing factor remaining for your product. Be creative and come up with out-of-the-box solutions. This will help you to target your consumers in a better manner and would help them to relate to your product. A good example of this is KFC’s takeaway boxes. Not only are they functional but the logo of Col. Sanders creates an emotional bonding with the users.

Choose Your Packaging Material Wisely

The Package Material should be wisely chosen as preservation of the contents is the main priority of the package’s design. You could go with conventional packaging material or you could use innovative materials and designs to increase functionality while maximizing the value of investments made on packaging. If you use green packaging, then it would also help your products to contribute towards sustainable business practices and would also help to inculcate the practice of recycling material.

The Versatile Corrugated Paper & Its Uses

Corrugated paper is also known as ‘Craft’ or ‘Kraft’. This brown colored paper is a key material, used in the packing industry. Packing cartons are made up of craft paper. Apart from this, corrugated paper is widely used in making envelops and covering the books and notebooks of the school kids. Its durability and strength makes it a very popular kind of paper for general purpose usage. Corrugated paper and its products are easily recycled, when no longer needed and in fact, most corrugated paper is made, at least partially, of recycled paper. Its products are generally used as a re-use material.

Corrugated paper is available in the market in two forms - lined and unlined. The lined paper is a rigid layered paper surrounding a fluted layer laid between one or more smooth liner layers. The fluted layer is meant to confer additional support and strength. The lined corrugated paper is - what is commonly known as cardboard. The unlined paper only comprises of the fluted layer and is therefore, quite flexible.

All the products made up of corrugated paper are lightweight, durable and versatile. Cardboard or the lined corrugated paper is the most remarkably used for making the corrugated shipping boxes, which are used for moving, storing and shipping the items. Lined corrugated paper can also be printed with bright graphics and colours so as to serve as sturdy, temporary product display for stores. So, it is widely used for this purpose, especially for the products like children’s toys. The neat look of this paper gels well with the contemporary industrial aesthetic.

The unlined corrugated paper is primarily used to protect fragile items during shipping or sometimes, even for decorative purposes. The unlined corrugated paper, meant for decoration is available in many bright colours and is the most commonly used to border bulletin boards of institutions and hospitals. The boxes made up of the unlined corrugated paper come in variety of strengths and are used based on the amount of weight they can bear. These boxes display their Edge Crush Test Rating at the bottom, which is basically the amount of weight it can endure before its edges will get crushed or will bend. Majority of the corrugated boxes are single walled and have only one layer of paper. Any of the additional layers confer more strength to the boxes or the other products of corrugated paper.

The corrugated paper rolls find use in packaging products of diverse range of industries including food processing, textiles, stationery and plastic companies. Processed foods like confectionery and bakery items are usually supplied by the manufacturers in different types of corrugated paper rolls. These are available in different lengths and colours in order to meet the extensive market demand well.

The Shopping Bag: The Hidden Marketing Potential of the Secondary Packaging

Product packaging has gone from being simple containers to actual brand enhancers. The trend today has gone beyond conventional boundaries of thought with components such as electronic support units (Example: RFID) and functional elements such as pizza boxes that help to keep the pizza hot for a longer time. It is these changes that are defining the nature and trend of packaging which has brought out its hidden potential and it clearly indicates that the secondary packaging has a lot to it than what meets the eye.

It’s All in the Looks!

No one ever considers Shopping Bags as creative advertising and marketing tools when in fact it is the packaging that affects the buyer’s decision. When people underestimate the power of the shopping bags as a powerful marketing tool, they are not wrong. The trend of using interactive, functional and visually appealing shopping bags has surfaced rather recently with the packages themselves serving an important purpose of enhancing brand image as well as generating value for the brand. 

Customers Relate Better to Visually Attractive Shopping Bags!

It does not take heavy investments or super creative geniuses to figure out deigns that not only convey effective messages but convey information with a certain humour that everyone seems to cherish. Take for example the image where a shopping bag is depicted as having a digestive system replication. When people use the shopping bag to carry vegetables, it only exemplifies the message that has been printed on it – “Help Cure Hunger in New York”. Now this is a message that everyone can relate to.

Appealing Shopping Bags that Are Functional!

It was but evident that the growing trend of creative and appealing gift carry bags would require an edge to be able to stand out from the crowd. So, manufacturers came up with a functional aspect of the packaging bags that allowed them to be used to serve the products in a better manner. Consider this image depicting a creative shopping bag for carrying coffee. When you open the bag from its latch, it opens up into a beautiful tray so that the coffee can be served right from its package. This is indeed a very useful way of making optimal utilization of secondary packaging.

E-Packaging – The Next Step in Smart Packaging Solutions

With electronic integration being evident in almost all spheres of life, packaging solutions have also taken the next step towards digital enhancement wherein smart additions have been made. The global demand for e-packaging (electronic devices for smart packaging) is expected to rise from approximately $0.028 billion (current worth) to $1.7 billion by the year 2022. A large part of this great demand would revolve around consumer packaged goods (CPGs). So what does e-packaging have in store for us in the future?

What is E-Packaging?

 

E-packaging refers to the integration electronic devices and printing of conductive circuit right onto the substrate of the Packaging Material. RFID and EAS are the most commonly used electronic components in e-packaging wherein it becomes really convenient to track specific products in a large storage facility. It also helps to digitally acquire the data about the products by simply moving the product within the range of the scanner. There is no need for physically scanning it. Moreover, the addition of such electronic facilities helps to enhance the overall presentation as well as the brand value of the product.

Benefits of Using E-Packaging:

E-Packaging helps to improve merchandising by allowing people to digitally keep track of its usage and movement. A good example of this is the use of e-packaging for tablets and specific drugs where the removal time and date is stored to know exactly when it was removed from its intended location. This really helps to monitor the products in an effective manner. Some of the most creative applications of e-packing include talking pizza boxes, winking logos which add a personal touch to the branding of the products by making them interactive, etc. Another important aspect of this integration is the use of anti-theft mechanisms where products may be traced in case they stolen. 

What Does the Future Have in Store for Packaging Material?

There have been various developments in packaging materials with some innovations focusing on the “green” aspect of the product while others focus on increasing the overall efficiency of the packaging. There is stiff competition in the packaging market today for which manufacturers need to focus on using as less raw materials as possible without compromising on the safety of the contents as well as the durability of the package’s design. Check out some of the developments that have been going on in the packaging world.

Packaging Material Used in Transporting:

Innovations in packaging design coupled with the increasing trend of recycling products has enabled businesses to come up with economic packaging solutions that not only provide great cost benefits but they also help to take innovative progressions to the next level. Hybrids Pallets and Hybrid Containers are great examples of this trend. Pallets are usually made from wood but it is easily destroyed. Plastic, the next popular consideration, is durable but it can be expensive to bear. Innovators have come up with a unique solution that combines the best aspects of wood and plastic to create a hybrid container / packaging wherein wooden frames are combined joined with plastic remoulded bumpers. Less plastic means the package will go easy on the pocket. The use of wood would ensure higher capacities that what is made possible with the use of plastic alone.

Material Used in Product Packaging:

More than a defined manufacturing process segment, product packaging has evolved into an intrinsic art form which relies on science for feasible implementation while creative inclinations help to get valuable inspirations. Necessity is indeed the driving force behind innovation. Product manufacturers, especially edible products, in the EU are imprinting brands and other labels directly onto the skin of the produce to save up on packaging requirements.

Using Secondary Packaging for Enhanced Safety:

Secondary packaging usually refers to the use of cushioning material that is put inside the main packaging to protect delicate contents. In order to understand the implications of this component, take the example of large consignments of products that are already packed in individual packages. In order to transport them with maximum space utilization, the individual packages are further packed into larger boxes. These boxes are discarded after use and they do not even make it to the hands of the consumers. In a way, these secondary boxes are an avoidable addition to the overall packaging process. Businesses today are working towards eliminating the use of this secondary layer completely to save up on costs and contribute towards maximizing the correct utilization of resources. 

$244 Billion – That’s the Expected Worth of the Global Sustainable Packaging Market by 2018

Smithers Para have come up with a report which states that legislative forces, increasing developments in material technology and the dynamics of consumer demand will drive the market for sustainable packaging to such an extent that the net worth would become $224 billion by 2018. One of the major reasons behind this drive is the increasing awareness of environmental protection and the interest in reducing the carbon footprint of a region.

Packaging Materials are being focused for encouraging sustainability because they are the most commonly used products in our daily life and due to the usually high requirements of safety from these packaging, they are made with plastic, paper and other materials which may be required. While paper and wood based products can be reused and recycled, it is the plastic component which causes the major issues. Materials such as bubble wrap are quite beneficial as padding for delicate items, but since they have the composite substance as plastic, their recyclability is limited. 

Sustainable packaging is a relatively new term approach that has become part of the major environmental considerations done for packaging. This involves careful and detailed analysis of the overall design, composite materials, recyclability, end product usage and reuse potential of the Packaging Material. The ongoing research into sustainable packaging practices is just the tip of the iceberg as compared to the actual efforts which would be required to achieve the success that is expected by scholars and experts in this industry.

If you consider the overall benefit of the use of sustainable packaging to the global economic factors, then it would provide major cost benefits, the market trends would also be dictated by the presence as well as demand for such materials, the environment would be given a major boost as the depletion of the natural reserves would be delayed and the overall carbon footprint could be reduced to a certain extent. All of these factors would contribute in making this market a really profitable and successful market in a span of just 4 years.