Insights

Food Packaging Design – 5 Ways to Succeed

Food Packaging Design

Food Packaging Design is an essential tool that you must utilise to gain attention for your brand and product. The Food and Drink market is increasingly competitive and high-quality, appealing packaging design is essential to tackle this huge competition. 

Product packaging not only keeps your product safe in transit, but it is also an effective marketing tool that helps you differentiate your brand from your competitors and create memorable customer experiences.  

Here are five things that you must consider when creating your food packaging design to grab customer attention and secure sales. 

Target Audience 

When creating your food packaging design, one of the first things to consider is your target audience. It is essential to understand your potential consumer, including what will entice them and appeal to their needs. 

When creating concepts for your packaging design, ask yourself, who are you selling your product to? If it is a young audience, this will influence the packaging design with playful and colourful imagery to catch their attention. However, if you are a high-end brand aiming for a more mature audience, you may opt for a more subtle, luxurious design with added embellishments.  

Food Packaging Design

In the examples, Swizzels use playful, colourful imagery to appeal to their target market of families with their confectionary product. In comparison, Dr. Will’s appeal to a higher end market with minimal but luxury packaging design for their natural sugar free classic mayo product. 

Whichever your target audience, make sure they are being kept in the forefront of your mind when making packaging design decisions to appeal to your consumer’s needs. 

Where Your Product Is Being Sold 

An important thing to consider when creating your food product packaging design is where it is being sold. Is your product going to be listed on ecommerce stores online? On the shelf in a retail environment? Or both? 

Where consumers experience your product will have a large impact on the packaging design. This is because you must target online and in-store audiences differently in order to draw their attention to your brand and product.  

Both types of packaging have important roles in the customer purchasing journey but at different points. 

Retail packaging advertises your brand on-shelf in a store environment where your target audience can be drawn to your product with an appealing packaging design. Packaging design here creates the all-important first impression and attracts a consumer to buy from your brand. 

Food Packaging Design

When showcasing their products on their ecommerce store, Dr. Will’s make use of additional copy and graphics to help sell their products. As seen in the example above, Dr. Will’s feature their product’s unique selling points and benefits surrounding a packshot of their barbeque sauce so consumers can quickly learn about the product before purchase. 

Ecommerce packaging is experienced after-purchase in a physical sense, determining satisfaction and repeat purchases. For ecommerce websites, you can showcase your product packaging design digitally with product photography and packshots to entice an online audience. 

Sustainability and Recyclability 

Your food packaging design is an ideal chance to align your brand identity with your audience’s values.  

Is your product packaging going to be sustainable and/or recyclable? Your packaging design is a perfect opportunity to shout about this! Consumers are looking out for Vegan, Cruelty-Free, Sustainable and Recyclable icons on packaging to fit with their own eco-friendly values. 

Many consumers find sustainability information on packaging confusing, as it may not always be clear on how to recycle a product.  

Food packaging design

As seen in the example above, Nestlé make it very clear on their new Smarties paper packaging what the packaging material is and that it is recyclable. Making it easy for consumers to note the brand’s priority of recycling on this product.  

When creating your food packaging design, consider how you will include this information in a clear and concise way. 

Are you running out of space on your packaging design? Consider interactive packaging and QR codes to educate your consumers on how to recycle your products. 

Family of Products 

Is the product you are creating a new packaging design for going to be part of an existing product family? If the answer is yes, then you need to know how your packaging design will work across all products, as well as taking into consideration varying substrates and packaging components.  

In addition, all your brand’s product packaging should house the same branding and be visually similar in order to create a ‘family’ of products. 

Food Packaging Design

Your product family must appear cohesive and consistent. Packaging design should be uniform across your product catalogue, allowing your branding to become instantly recognisable both online and in-store.  

Those who are new to your brand will instantly notice that your brand is cohesive and packaging design is something that you have well-thought-out. Consistent packaging will allow existing customers to recognise your new product as belonging to your brand right away. 

After-Sales Experience 

The after-purchase experience of your product is an important thing to consider, especially when your product was purchased online on your ecommerce store.  

The unboxing experience is a valuable touchpoint in the purchasing journey that can help drive repeat purchases by providing your consumer with an enjoyable experience. 

A memorable after-sales experience may utilise customised branded packaging for delivery to excite customers when opening their online orders. This branded packaging further pushes the consistency of your product range, reinforcing your brand messaging throughout the entire purchasing experience. 

Food Packaging Design

According to Dotcom Distribution, 68% of online shoppers report that branded or premium packaging makes a brand appear more upscale, while 61% say that branded aesthetics get them more excited about receiving/opening a package. 

To conclude, in order to navigate the wide competition in the Food & Drinks market, you must create an eye-catching packaging design that stands out. Consider the five points we have outlined above to craft a successful product that captures consumer attention.  

Are you a Food and Drinks brand looking to elevate your packaging design? Get in touch to discuss your latest project! 

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