What is the packaging and how to pack a product?
Inseparable from the product it contains, the packaging ensures a multitude of roles. It protects, of course, ensures the conservation of foodstuffs and facilitates transport as storage.It also seduces, it catches the eye of the potential buyer and displays the essential information relating to its product. Practical and ever smarter, the product packaging is not to be taken lightly and is worked out with the utmost care.
The different types of packaging
Simple or complex in appearance, the product packaging must specifically meet the specifications of the product. Over the logistics chain, there are 3 different types:
• Primary packaging: This is the form in which the product is presented in the different points of sale. Bottles containing liquids, pots containing yogurts, pouches protecting crisps or biscuits.
Ubiquitous, the primary packaging is usually completed by an over-pack, not very good for the planet! Some stores will tend to favor bulk sales or simple packaging to limit waste.
• Secondary packaging: Generally made of cardboard, it promotes the transport of goods and their placement on the shelves. For example, it includes batch yogurts or cookie bags in a single cardboard packaging.
It is usually he who stands on the shelf under the eyes of the consumer and who determines his choice. With optimized dimensions, it facilitates the transportation of goods and helps reduce costs.
• Tertiary packaging: Mostly invisible to the customer, it corresponds to the grouping of products in delivery units. These are filmed pallets, crates, plastic covers that help with logistics and distribution.
They are found especially in low-cost stores.
Specific and complementary, the different types of packaging produced follow one another during the delivery of a product. The water is bottled (primary) then batched in a plastic (secondary) package.
Packaging and logistics
Resistant and specifically adapted to what it contains, the product packaging facilitates all the stages of the logistic process. It prevents the degradation of the goods and the financial and environmental losses that could result.
In our regions, the proportion of food wastage is estimated to be 2-3%. A mess related to inappropriate conditions of transportation and packaging.
Well thought out, however, it can increase efficiency and manage the routing and storage optimally. The key is saving time and money and ensuring the preservation of the integrity of the goods.
• Transport: In respect of the dimensions of the product, the packaging contributes to the protection against shocks and external aggression. Weather, light and Physico-chemical attacks must not infiltrate!
For optimum protection, it is generally advisable to opt for a package slightly larger than the product contained. Padding, therefore, allows stalling the best goods.
Perfectly adapted, the product packaging also optimizes the use of vehicles with a filling rate of up to 100%. It is mass transport and it reduces the costs and the frequency of the journeys. Significant financial and ecological benefits.
• Storage: For each product its specificities and its storage mode. Fresh foods will have different requirements than pharmaceuticals and each will require appropriate packaging.
Beyond conservation, it is also the use of space that is at stake. Good packaging will save space and facilitate subsequent sampling operations.
Faced with the discontent of traders, the maple syrup brand Log Cabin thus changed its packaging deemed too impractical. For easier shelving and storage, metal boxes have been replaced by thin glass bottles.
Packaging and security
By protecting products during transport and handling, the product packaging ensures safety at other levels.
• Consumer safety: Some specific products require special attention as to their use. Well designed, the packaging reduces the risk of accidents and prevents toxic products from spreading.
In contact with food, he must also be able to preserve its quality and stabilization. All without contaminating the product itself.
In addition, some laws require manufacturers to legibly inform the consumer about the product he buys. The product packaging is then information carrier, as we will see a little further.
• Environmental safety: Pollution, destruction of the flora or the ozone layer, the packaging must also block the attacks of certain toxic products. Rigid and adaptable, it must in certain cases comply scrupulously with certain imposed standards.
Packaging and customer experience
Conditioned, stored, transported safely, here is the product finally presented to the potential buyer. And in this, the packaging plays a decisive role.
The first point of contact between a brand and a customer, it is he who ensures the visibility of a product in a radius saturated with competitors. A true means of communication, it will determine the attractiveness of a commodity well before its taste or its utility.
It involves seducing by the graphics, colors or materials while informing legibly. To convey the brand image while making the product exceptional.
On the shelves, the packaging is the big game and redoubled inventiveness to stand out. Games on the back of cereal packets, ideas recipes or lots to win, everything is possible.
Adapted to their environment, they bear the mark of cultural specificity and display their own identity. Purchase impulse, they also allow retaining new customers after the transaction, especially in the context of e-commerce.
Whatever the qualities of a product, it is the packaging that will add the touch necessary to customer satisfaction. Personalization of the package or packing tape, small attentions, the customer will appreciate the details that will strengthen his experience.
It is therefore essential to work with the product packaging carefully, both upstream and downstream of the purchase. The stage is essential for the attractiveness and durability of a brand.
band the truth, transparency, is what the consumer is looking for now. In this respect, the packaging is an excellent means of communicating information.
• Mandatory information: Many specific products require the appearance of certain practical information. It can be for example the chemical composition, precautions for use or the expiry date ...
Written in the majority languages of the destination market, they are intended to ensure the protection of the consumer.
• Tractability: Because buyers are asking themselves many questions today, packaging can also help to provide them with answers. Origin, mode of transportation or percentage of recyclable materials used may now appear.
Gathering a lot of information on a limited surface, the product packaging is striking and clear. The marking may appear directly on the package or on a label.
Innovations and ecology
Regardless of the material used, functionality remains at the heart of industrial innovation in terms of packaging. It takes practice and ergonomics!
In the boxes of Nestle infant formula, the teaspoon now fits in a specially designed cavity. The Nesquik chocolate box is now lighter with 10% fewer materials.
Small advances that the consumer does not necessarily notice. However, they allow packaging to keep up with customer concerns and environmental issues.Because eco-design tends to progress everywhere. Size and weight reduced, recyclable materials, sorting facilities, the packaging is cleaner and smarter.
The French, more concerned about their packaging choices, call for more appropriate solutions. Concentrated cleaning products in smaller bottles or finer packaging made of recycled material, the packaging accommodates and remains what it has always been: the result of a reflection taking into account all the concerns of the moment.
Better thought product packaging means less waste and trucks on the road. An element that can, according to the consumer profile, constitute a formidable factor of attractiveness!
Packaging, the heart of your strategy
At the same time reduced and adapted to the dimensions of the product, solid and innovating, the packing did not finish to surprise us! If practicality prevails for 76% of consumers, the visual aspect plays a role of importance. The product packaging is thought, elaborated, the wrong direction sometimes to return to the race in an ever more creative way.
The challenge is, beyond the security point of view, to offer a real shopping experience. Want to try yours?
Put your products on the stage with the specially adapted original packaging that will surely mark everyone's mind!
