Jeremy Martin Marketing director, For Goodness Shakes!

Packaging is the gateway to your product. It sets expectations. It makes a promise. It even discriminates, inviting customers you want and excluding those you don't. Brilliant packaging can replace advertising and promotion. Yes, you can sell a duff product in great packaging. But only once.

Product and packaging are 'one'. It's the whole package that counts. Think Gü puds. The promise starts with the pack and ends with the last crumb. Or Innocent. The transparency. The delivery of nothing but fruit.

When we designed the For Goodness Shakes! bottle, it had to reflect the strength and energy-giving promise of the product, so we created the 'athlete dumbbell' bottle. It's a manly and functional design, just like the milkshake itself.

How do you test whether you've got a great product? Start with the packaging and ask customers whether it 'does exactly what it says on the tin'.



Eddie Stableford Managing director, Bryt, brand design and marketing consultancy



With the grocery retail sector highly developed, every category comprises a plethora of products co-existing with each other and competing for the attention of the consumer.

The average purchase decision takes just three seconds, so packaging has to create an instant dialogue with a potential purchaser. If it's a regular purchase, the packaging shape, form and colour act as visual shorthand, enabling the consumer to quickly identify it on shelf. For a new product the task is more complex. Just as we have to work harder when we meet someone for the first time, packaging has to use its own body language to communicate key product attributes.

With only 20% of the purchasing decision taking place consciously, the brand identity and other components of the design play a crucial role.

It is vital that packaging accurately reflects the quality of the offering - an imbalance will not achieve success. Poor packaging on a super product is going to be just as ineffective as great packaging on a poor product.