Early and Often: Harnessing the Consumer's Voice in Packaging Design

by Robert Wallace

What is the secret to launching a successful—that is, profitable—new product? That's the million-dollar question companies are asking today. While there is no single proven recipe, there are certainly ingredients that make success far more likely. First and foremost, savvy companies know that consumers are choosing products based on more than just the traditional factors of brand name and price.

In fact, a product's aesthetic appeal is an increasingly important consideration in consumers' product selections. Translation: Compelling design and packaging help drive sales. Given the dizzying array of product choices, it is no surprise that many consumers default to making purchase decisions based on a product's visual appeal. According to Marketing Intelligence Service, which tracks new products worldwide, in 1991 there were 15,000 products on grocery store shelves. Today, there are over 45,000! Companies are investing millions of dollars to develop line extensions, enter new categories and introduce new brands. Still, approximately 80% of new product launches fail—typically because they fail to ignite consumer interest.

Realistically, if a new product or package does not stand out from the competition and entice consumers to buy within the first several months of its release, few firms are financially able to commit further resources to make improvements that will stimulate sales. Of course, one might also argue that even with additional financial resources, improvements would be a losing proposition if they were developed without specific, effective consumer insight. Given the high rate of marketplace failure, companies are under increasing financial pressure for products to be "right" from the start—right in terms of a consumer-appealing design that sells product.

The key to finding the innovative design that grabs consumer attention is as simple as: Stop, Look, Listen. Stop thinking the way you've always tackled product and packaging design is the best approach; think outside the box and explore some of the newer methodologies that have emerged in recent years. Look at ways to increase your success rate by considering the most possible number of design alternatives—think hundreds or thousands of options instead of dozens. Most importantly, Listen very closely to the needs and wants of your target consumers and do it as early and often as possible in the design and development process.

Key considerations

To better understand why early consumer input in the design and development process is so critical, it's helpful to understand the barriers inherent in the typical approach to package design. Generally, these projects convene a cross-functional team of internal and external decision makers (often including R&D, manufacturing and finance, as well as marketing and market research) charged with creating innovative designs at minimal cost. This broad group must develop products, create package designs, manage costs, coordinate manufacturing, and obtain consumer input.

External input from consultants or design firms is usually critical, given that design is not a core competency for many CPG firms. These companies realize that an outside, objective perspective is critical in helping to determine the right combination of text, colors, graphics, and packaging material that will stand out on the retail shelf. The design elements must be all rolled up into a cohesive final package without overwhelming the target consumers.

While most current market research methodologies—including participant observation, open-ended interviews, focus groups, clinics, and surveys—involve some form of consumer input, they are often not up to the task of inviting consumer input throughout the design process. These methodologies face a significant challenge: a data set that is too large to efficiently and cost-effectively explore the infinite combinations of packaging designs and then obtain the wide range of desired consumer input. When this happens, consumer input is not fully able to help the design team evolve the most preferred product or package design.

With intense pressure to generate unique products speedily and packages that map to consumer preferences, companies are looking at alternatives to the more traditional processes. This includes approaches that enable them to adequately capture consumer input as early as possible in—and throughout—the development process. Methodologies are available that help companies explore multitudes of design possibilities to determine the best concept—all with the goal of developing more successful products and packaging.

By layering the different elements of designs, Affinnova's IDEA tool can allow consumers to review millions of potential design combinations.

Developing a new 7-Up

Cadbury-Schweppes had a significant product launch on the horizon—the introduction of the first carbonated beverage containing nutrients from a major brand, 7-Up. Cadbury-Schweppes concluded very early in the product development process that consumer input was going to be key in designing the packaging for its new 7-Up Plus product. 7-Up Plus has a distinct feature set that needed to be clearly communicated on the packaging—these features being nutritional value, types of sweeteners, and low carbohydrate levels.

To guide package design and the overall product launch, Cadbury sought to better understand how specific features drive consumer preference and to use this information to ultimately create the optimal package. Using Affinnova's IDEA (Interactive Design by Evolutionary Algorithms) for Package Design Optimization, package design ideas were broken out into specific components, such as images, colors, package materials, background, text layout, and word marks. These elements, displayed in text and graphics and representing literally millions of package designs, were then presented to consumers via an online exercise. During this process, consumers selected their preferred elements to "evolve" the designs. This process leverages Affinnova's technology to mimic the genetic process of "survival of the fittest" and present consumers with more preferred designs, based on previous choices.

At the end of the exercise, Cadbury netted six leading designs from among the millions of potential combinations consumers viewed using Affinnova's evolutionary product design technology. These designs reflected a spectrum of attributes that mapped to consumer preferences such as varying backgrounds, color schemes, logo placements, etc. Interestingly, the exercise also identified leading designs that resonated very well with three of Cadbury's key targeted consumer sub-groups. Having a greater understanding of the package elements that appealed to their various audiences, Cadbury was able to choose a final design integrating components from all six "finalist" designs that would appeal to each segment. A solid product paired with a strong package has made 7-Up Plus a strong performer over the last two years.

Short product and package development schedules require that CPGs narrow down design options as quickly as possible.

Design lessons learned

Completing a complex consumer insights project such as the one undertaken by Cadbury in a reasonable timeframe would be virtually impossible without new market research technologies that offer the means to easily capture consumer input. Cadbury's success is, in part, testament to its commitment to involving consumers early and effectively in the package development process. Doing so removed the artificial and subjective "winnowing" phase from the process, allowing the product development team to reveal consumers' most preferred designs.

In "The Substance of Style," author and New York Times columnist Virginia Postrel argues that consumers increasingly make purchasing decisions based on how products make them feel. "In a crowded marketplace," Postrel says, "aesthetics is often the only way to make a product stand out." To develop a product or package that is not only attractive and appealing but is what consumers actually want, companies must go straight to the source—consumers themselves—as early as possible. The advent of new technologies to explore the millions of potential designs is increasingly making this early interaction not only possible, but also highly effective in terms of project cost and product success.

Robert Wallace leads Affinnova's marketing efforts and oversees the company's position as a game-changing technology and service provider to the consumer goods industry. Mr. Wallace can be reached at BWallace@affinnova.com