Branding Your Packaging – 5 Things to Think About

Today Moira from Hunt and Gather Design is sharing 5 things to think about when branding your packaging. Great if you want to refresh your product packaging for the New Year.

In a previous post, I spoke about using all the elements of how your business is seen and encountered by your customer to evoke the feel of your brand. One of the key ways to do this (and the most fun – for you and your customer!) is to do something a bit special with packaging.

I consider five main things when deciding how to package a new product, which will depend on whether I’m packaging the individual item for point of sale (i.e., at a fair or for a shop), posting the products direct to a customer, or to a shop for wholesale:

Shape / Materials –

Are you packaging a print, notebook, a soft object, ceramics? After you’ve protected what needs protecting (e.g., fragile objects or delicate materials), consider how you want your customer to first see your item. For me, this depends on where it’s going – if I’m packaging for a fair or shop, I’ll make sure the product is easy to see and pick up; if the product has been bought from my online shop, I relish the opportunity to have a little bit of ‘theatre’ and make the unpacking part of the experience.

Information –

For all items, it’s good to include some information about your product. Have your business name & web address so the recipient can find out more about you, and tell a little about the story of your item too. How was it made? It it limited edition? What materials is it made from? For example, I include these as little information sheets in the back of cyanotype notebooks and prints, and as printed labels attached to the lavender hearts.

Aesthetics –

This is the fun bit! What feel do you want the packaging to have? For Hunt and Gather Design, I wanted a rough luxury feel – for the recipient to feel like they’ve just received the most precious gift when the package arrives. For example, I wrap my handbound books and lavender hearts with cotton (stamped with my logo), held together with rough twine, wax sealed to my business card. The book or heart is protected by the cotton but it also says something about the brand to the person who receives it. For a different style, have a look at the lovely branded packaging for Perideau Designs to see how different elements come together as a whole.

Budget –

The not-so-fun bit! Look at how much it costs to do what you’d ideally like to do for your products and figure out if you’re happy with that price. Is it worth it for the effect it will have when received? Is there a more cost effective way to produce the packaging? I use the same off-centre business cards for use with the wax sealed and the hole-punched/grommeted tags. I’m also happy to spend a bit more in the way I package up individual items to send to customers (that bit of ‘theatre’ I mentioned) than I would when sending a batch to wholesale shops, where margins are tighter and the effect not as necessary.

Practicality of posting/materials –

How fragile is your product? Will it tarnish easily? Does it need to be kept upright? Will it easily fit within one of the standard posting sizes or weight brackets for your postal service? If you are wholesaling to shops, how can you cost-effectively fit a number of the products into the same box?

There’s a whole other blog post about the ‘how to’ of making branded boxes and printed tags, so I’ll share some tips next time!

Moira Fuller makes and sells a range of beautiful handbound books and prints for her shop Hunt and Gather Design. Her Autumn/Winter 2011 range Into the Woods is available now.