Product packaging

Product packaging has assumed great importance in modern marketing. Packaging is not only an important means of protecting the content (its first and most important single purpose), but it is also a powerful means of pre-selling the consumer and of assisting in the in-store selection.
Packaging has not only become a multi-billion-dollar business-it is estimated that American manufacturers spend as much as eleven-billion dollars annually for packaging and package research-but it has become one of the best and most effective means of differentiating one product from another. In order to make one offering different from another, a product is branded, given a name of its own, and packaged in a distinctive manner.
The package that gives the consumer an advantage, gives greater satisfaction in some manner, is the one that has the advantage in the market. This may come from some sales gimmick, like a pouring spout, or a cellophane tape for easy opening. It may be the advantage of a new packaging material. The aerosol package and the plastic squeeze bottle are examples.
New packaging changes have become as numerous, and often as important, as new product changes. New types of treated paper are being developed as suitable substitutes for tin; new plastics are rapidly supplanting tin and steel plate, as well as glass, in some fields. New- use ideas are being developed daily, calling for different types of packages.
Because packaging made earlier and rapid headway in the food industry, and because self-service merchandising in supermarkets would have been impossible without packaging, the art of packaging has perhaps developed furthest by manufacturers supplying the supermarkets. This covers food and grocery products primarily; but it also includes drug, cosmetic and toiletry articles, generally designated as health and beauty aids.
The supermarkets needed packages that would be easy to handle, easy to store, easy to display, and that would carry sales appeal to the consumer who would spend an average of less than half an hour in the store, selecting from a wide variety of products. Supermarket packaging has developed certain merchandising characteristics, the furnishing of which has developed entirely new industries of package designing and package engineering.