Do not underestimate the importance of packaging design in business. When people talk about packaging, especially in e-commerce, it centers around its role to protect the item inside. It is the retailer’s responsibility to ensure that the product arrives at the doorstep of the customer in perfect condition; no dents, no cracks, and functioning as intended.
However, the packaging matters in other ways. It can be a form of advertising, and it can create a unique shopping experience that can boost sales and encourage brand recognition and recall.
Packaging is more than just putting a product in a bag or box. The most successful brands put effort toward adding a compelling and eye-catching design to bags and boxes you can get wholesale.
Packaging Influences Emotions
All purchases, no matter how rational, have an emotion attached to them. Although, as a consumer, you are not consciously thinking about how buying a certain product makes you feel, it is there, and it pushes you to spend your money on it. It is most obvious among impulse buyers, but even those who think about their purchases are influenced by their emotions.
Researchers have already looked into how the impact of packaging influences buying decisions. They used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to see how consumers react to various packaging (attractive, unattractive, neutral) at an unconscious level. They found that, when presented with products encased in attractive packaging, the parts of the brain associated with reward lit up. In contrast, unattractive packaging increased the activity in areas of the brain linked with negative emotions. The researchers concluded that well-designed packaging does create a stronger impulse buying tendency among consumers.
This does not come as a surprise. Over the years, brands have presented their products in innovative packaging. It drummed up increased interest among consumers. In many cases, customers made purchases because of the packaging alone. When lined up in grocery stores, packaging also sets a product apart from competitors because it catches the customer’s attention.
It boosts sales and is an effective way to advertise a new or old product. Packaging is even more crucial at the age of social media, where everyone documents every moment of their lives. Unboxing a purchase is a moment that consumers nowadays record to post on their respective social media pages. Attractive packaging is an advertisement.
Packaging Creates Branding
You know exactly what a bottle of Coca-Cola looks like. You will be able to recognize the box from which the iPhone or the iPad comes in. These are only two of the best examples of well-designed packaging and how it reimposes brand recognition and recall.
Think about it: it is the last thing that your customers see before they experience the product. It would help if you made a good last impression so that consumers will remember the brand and associate it with the positive feelings that come with receiving a purchase.
What Do Consumers Want?
Consumers have different preferences when it comes to packaging. You cannot please them all, but you can make the packaging memorable and efficient to boost sales and encourage brand recognition.
More people, for example, want environmentally-friendly packaging. Those concerned about climate change and its impact on the planet consider packaging a factor in deciding to purchase a product. They are more likely to support businesses that use packaging that is considered to be sustainable and biodegradable. Plastic is no longer an attractive packaging because it does not disappear from the planet for a really long time. Plastic also creates micro-plastics, pollutants that are so small, they are practically everywhere, including in food and water, if people cannot see them. A minimalist packaging that uses fewer materials is also a good selling point.
Some companies are designing packaging that consumers can reuse after purchase. The packaging would not be thrown away; it stays in customers’ homes for a long time, reducing waste and serving as an advertising opportunity.
Most importantly, the packaging has to stand out. The packaging can be sustainable or reusable. If not, it should have an eye-catching design that will set itself apart from competitors and make the buying experience extra special for the customer.
Packaging is an important factor that has an impact on the decision of consumers to make a purchase. It can make a difference in catching their attention. While most people throw away the packaging after purchase, it still can be one of those elements that determine whether they buy the product again from the same brand or switch to its competitors.