Package Design | packagedesignmag.com

(January 2008) posted on Sun Sep 27, 2009

By Ron Romanik

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Any shopper who wanders into a Staples store to buy staples will likely leave with the Staples brand of staples. This is not an accident. Staples ' well-organized store shelves and pegboards promote store-branded products as much—if not more—than their competitors on shelf.

A visit to the paper section of the store, usually visible as one enters the store, exposes the shopper to a virtual wall of Staples branded reams of paper. The current package design of their standard printer and copier paper grades features a bright yellow "sunburst" color field with a playful origami-like image in the center. Depending on the variety, that image could be a folded paper star, hat, snowflake, tree, or leaf, among others.

In less than 22 years, Staples has grown from one store to over 2000 stores worldwide, making it the largest retailer of office supplies in the world. The Staples brand, carefully tended to at the Framingham, MA, headquarters, is so strong that a button whose only function is to say "That was easy" has sold 2.5 million units since the fall of 2005. The "easy" button transitioned from a fictional prop in Staples television ads into a ubiquitous cultural icon, now available in three languages.

A touchy feely approach

Currently, Staples has about 2,400 store brand products that represent about 20% of total Staples sales. The core store brand products offer a value proposition and feature straightforward designs and color schemes. The bold Helvetica type of the Staples logo is carried down to product names, which are usually concisely descriptive.

In recent years, product developers, brand managers, and package designers at Staples have introduced new store brand strategies that impress with style and flair. Staples Business Essentials, for instance, is a fun collection of binder clips, paper clips, magnets, and push pins in a variety of patterns and colors introduced for the recent holiday season.

The Staples Innovation products, on the other hand, are office tools developed by Staples to make office chores easier. The two One-Touch products—a line of staplers and a hole punch—illustrate some important characteristics of Staples branded products and packages. Most importantly, the products and packages must emphasize that buying and using the product will make the user 's office life easier.