Production Packaging Innovations (PPI) is geared towards providing solutions for your packaging needs. Innovation is not just in our name, it’s in our nature. PPI focuses on meeting customer needs and offering solutions in efficient and affordable ways.
With roots stretching back 140 years, we know our trade inside and out. Our commitment to innovation is also apparent in our past, as during the 1950s we were Australia’s first to perform flexographic printing on poly bags.
Packaging Innovation in Consumer Trends
- Smart Packaging
Customer-centric brand marketing holds the key to creating and sustaining long-lasting product value. There’s little arguing about what happens when companies know how to solve customers’ problems– they earn greater brand loyalty and broader market share. That’s why every consumer product goods (CPG) maker across every conceivable industry segment focuses on optimizing customer experiences, starting with product packaging. Digitization, experience seekers and a growing base of tech-savvy consumers who are willing to engage with companies on a digital level are driving this packaging innovation.
Also known as active packaging or intelligent packaging, smart packaging refers to solutions with two-level interaction for greater consumer engagement through the use of digital technologies.
Traditional product brands and startups both have the opportunity to take advantage of smart packaging for differentiated offerings, loyalty and rich streams of consumer data that can lead to entirely new business models.
The ability to align brands more closely and constantly with consumer lifestyles, smart devices and the Internet of Things is transforming how customers choose and interact with consumer devices, consumer packaged goods (CPG), consumer healthcare products as well as food and beverages.
Think about baby formula, for instance. In response to consumers’ need for safety and authenticity, baby formula producers are looking to smart labels, which can sense first opening and provide information to consumers and companies about authenticity, integrity and freshness. In this data exchange, consumers can use the product knowing that it is safe to do so, while the producers could track information such as the time between purchase and consumption, getting better insight into consumer behaviors.
- Sustainable Packaging
As discussions about the environmental impact we make as a society come into question, consumers are becoming more environmentally conscious, which require new packaging innovations. The adoption of sustainable packaging requires a holistic approach. Opportunities must be found to connect people, places and partnerships to make positive impacts on society and the environment while overcoming myriad challenges. Historically, plastics were based on non-renewal resources, so they didn’t convert or breakdown to basic molecules. The broad variations of resin types used also created numerous separation and recycling impediments.
To overcome these barriers and drive sustainable packaging innovations, industry stakeholders must unite in advancing design improvements that increase the use of recyclable and compostable materials. Equally important is encouraging greater investment in reprocessing technologies that can forever change how plastic packaging is designed, made and re-used.
Organizations of all sizes can put circular economy principles to work and they can start by rethinking the design and development of products and packaging so they can be recycled or repurposed easily and affordably.
A leader in specialty coffee and innovative, single-service brewing systems, Keurig Green Mountain (Keurig) is committed to delivering exceptional coffee as well as using the power of business to build resilient supply chains, sustainable products and thriving communities. To that end, the company has pledged to make 100 percent of its iconic K-Cup pods recyclable by 2020.
- E-Commerce Packaging
Consumers are increasingly willing to shop on alternative channels outside of the physical brick-and-mortar stores. Today it’s hard to remember the days before Amazon, Paypal and SSL encryption. The e-commerce phenomenon has ushered in an extreme shift in consumer experience over the past two decades. Although it started with easily shippable objects including books, CDs and DVDs, it is now possible to buy almost anything you can think of – from razors to Riesling – while sitting in front of a screen.
Brands and their packaging partners are in the midst of a significant transition away from a world where packages primarily sit on store shelves waiting to entice potential buyers to one where packages sit in warehouses awaiting a “ready to buy” webpage click. This requires a different type of packaging innovation to meet e-commerce needs.
As a result, the brand and packaging professionals responsible for the final product must evolve their e-commerce packaging solutions to support the new retail reality. Adapting to a whole new world of e-commerce potentially means shipping considerations and device-to-consumer platforms designed to support repeat purchases to a wide variety of new technologies, innovations and bottling options.
When detergent pods were introduced into the market a few years prior, they took the industry by storm – entering a market with 100 percent penetration and increasing customer dissatisfaction levels. It was risky, but the right move to make for P&G.
In 2016, the company trialed an online, direct-to-consumer, subscription business for its Tide Pods: Tide Wash Club. The model was to offer free shipping on Tide Pods and deliver them to the consumer at regular intervals. Since the formula of the product in the pods have significantly less water than the liquid form, they are lighter. The design also makes them less prone to breakage and leakage during shipping.
- Devicification
Devicification is the opportunity to create a physical packaging platform that interlocks with smart devices. The physical platform may have various benefits such as smart materials that extend shelf life. It could also utilize the Internet of Things (IoT) as a means of communicating with a mobile device or computer, with most of the intelligence built into a smart device.
Devicification offers convenience that elevates the consumer experience. The capabilities of existing devices like coffee makers, paper towel dispensers and water filters can be amplified with connected solutions.
Opportunities for packaging innovation can be driven by shifts in consumer behavior and interests, as well as other macro trends in the marketplace. But true innovation comes from the intersection of people (desirability + usability), technical feasibility and business viability.