Package Design | packagedesignmag.com

(July 2011) posted on Mon Aug 22, 2011

By Patrick Henry

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Meghan Casserly, the “Girl Friday” blogger at Forbes.com, recently posted about a new product from Coty that she described as being nothing short of a “miracle.” The source of her epiphany, she wrote, was Sally Hansen Salon Effects Real Nail Polish Strips, a do-it-yourself nail treatment that gave her fingers the look of a professional manicure and cost her less than 10 bucks.

So enthusiastic was Casserly that she nominated Salon Effects as a “Name You Need to Know”—a Forbes designation for items poised to become central to the global conversation. The distinctive container should have no difficulty in provoking conversations of its own among package designers and brand managers in the innovation-driven cosmetics space. The development of the Salon Effects package tells a story of unusual creative demands met through close cooperation between the brand owner and its manufacturing service providers, with meticulous execution at every stage of production.

Minus the glass bottle
The nail strips, sold by Coty under the Sally Hansen brand, are the creation of Incoco Products, Clifton, NJ, which began developing what it calls “the world’s only flexible nail polish” more than 20 years ago. Produced on a special press, the strips are laminar combinations of a bottom adhesive layer overprinted with lacquer-based polish and a clear top coat. Incoco had begun marketing the strips itself as “dry nail appliqué” in a mostly opaque sleeve pouch, but under the media radar until Coty introduced Salon Effects.

The strips, which last about 10 days, sell for $8 to $10 in sets of 16. Users apply them by removing the backing, pressing the strip to the fingernail, and then shaping for a precise fit with tools that come in the package. With names like Misbehaved, Collide-o-Scope and Teal with It, the Nail Polish Strips have every bit of the razzle-dazzle visual appeal that those fanciful phrases imply.

Stick-on strips made of real nail polish are like nothing that most users of liquid nail treatments have tried before, and that novelty gave Coty a broad objective for the design of the packaging—but also a specific imperative. Says Soo Hyun Kang, the Coty senior designer who directed the creative development of the package design, “Because this is a new product for Coty, it’s important for consumers to see instantly what it is and what it’s for.”