March 2022
Question: How often does a packaging designer actually fully test their designs in real-world situations? I'm seeing more and more badly designed or badly implemented packaging these days and it's starting to raise my blood pressure - hence this rant and high pressure steam release.
Question: How often does a packaging designer actually fully test their designs in real-world situations? I'm seeing more and more badly designed or badly implemented packaging these days and it's starting to raise my blood pressure - hence this rant and high pressure steam release.
Packaging plays a huge part in marketing, whether it's making a product stand out or look attractive on a supermarket shelf or whether it enhances the product's brand perception as you unwrap what you have purchased. Apple has turned the "unboxing" of their products into an art form that many other companies now try to emulate.
So, why do so many others get it so wrong?
The best product in the world can start off with a bad and lasting first impression if you can't get into it or the packaging resolutely refuses to work as it should.
Early versions of cardboard milk and juice cartons were notoriously difficult to get into. You had to try and tear a plastic-coated cardboard corner off in a reasonably straight line so that when you came to pour the contents out it didn't end up everywhere but in your cup or glass. Fortunately, the designers seem to have rectified this by replacing the tear-off corner with a plastic screw-top. This has done nothing towards reducing single-use plastics, but at least now you don't end up with your morning orange juice in your lap.
One of my top annoyances is overly-complex cardboard food boxes with a myriad of perforations designed to tear so that the pack can be used repeatedly while the contents are consumed. You know the ones, they have a clever lid design that allows you to open the box, get the tea bag or coffee pod out and then close the lid and which is then supposed to "latch" shut. Yet, those pesky perforations rarely tear as designed and you end up with a lid that flaps loosely in the breeze or is ripped off in frustration altogether and often half destroys the rest of the box as well.
Then there are those hard, clear plastic "blister" packs that are welded around the edges. The only way of getting into them is to use an industrial angle grinder or, at the very least, a pair of scissors to cut the welded edge off. But, this leaves a plastic edge that rivals the sharpness of a Samurai sword intent on slicing your fingers off at the knuckles. The classic example of this is the blister package for scissors (pictured below), which can only be opened with... a pair of scissors!
Do you remember CD case wrappers? Particularly the old blank, recordable CDs? How long did you spend trying to find an edge or a corner to unpeel the wrapper. How many finger nails did you break scraping the cellophane to make a hole so that you could just get a tiny bit between your teeth to rip off?
More recently, I have noticed food packaging that has a plastic tray with a cellophane type lid that you need to tear off. How often do the edges just tear off leaving the lid intact which you then have to stab at with a fork or knife - re-enacting the “Shower Scene” from Psycho? Or, the ones where there is a little corner tab that is not supposed to be sealed so that you can get hold of it to tear back the lid. But, due to bad design, the outer edge of the tab is partially stuck down and you have to spend ages trying to get your finger nail in between to try and separate the tab. And, then when you finally do get hold of the tab, you either don't have the strength to rip the lid off or you have too much and just the tab comes away in your hand.
And, there's more...
Tear tabs that don't tear along perforations
Plastic milk bottles with the foil seal under the screw lid where the pull-tab comes off the first time you unscrew the lid leaving a seal that can't be peeled off.
Tear tabs that don't tear along perforations
Plastic milk bottles with the foil seal under the screw lid where the pull-tab comes off the first time you unscrew the lid leaving a seal that can't be peeled off.
Foil seals under the lids of sauce bottles that, although they now have a pull-tab, you need the strength of Arnold Schwarzenegger to actually prise them off. Or, you pull them off but they split, leaving a plastic membrane that you have stab at with something sharp.
Cling film boxes with serrated metal blades that become partially detached intent on slicing your fingers and push-in bits supposed to help the roll turn easily - but don't.
Child-proof laundry pod boxes that are, in my experience, adult-proof, too.
Cellophane wrappers with tear-strips that you can't find the end of.
Re-sealable lids on food trays that don't re-seal but just sort of curl up and stick to anything other than the tray.
Arrrrgh!
Is it just me...?
December 2023 - Update
Just had this happen to me with a plastic milk bottle - sums up this whole rant in one photo...
