For many shoppers a great pack design can be as big a drive to buy as the product itself.

One of the last-standing pure branding spaces available, your pack design can give you differentiation and stand-out as well as deliver sales and loyalty. But how do you know if you’ve got it right?

Here are five indicators that say it’s time to change your pack design, beyond the obvious driver – declining sales:

Change of brand meaning or design

Your pack design needs to live and breathe your brand as much as your advertising. So if you make a change, then this is a definite trigger that it’s time to refresh your packaging. Any change has to be reflected across your full-suite of packs; communicating the essence of what your brand stands for as well as its tone of voice and personality.

Environmental demands

Organisation, market or government demand for reducing environmental impact and ecological footprint is often a driver for brands to evaluate their pack design and production. The sustainable Packaging Coalition recommends considering all elements of the packaging journey. In an ideal world all packs would be developed with responsibly sourced materials, designed to be effective and safe throughout their life cycle, meet market criteria for performance and cost, be made using renewable energy and finally, recycled efficiently after use.

Competitor activity

A change in competitor activity or a new move into your market can shake things up, signalling a pack change. If you’re looking to reposition your brand in the market, perhaps to a value or premium proposition, than a change in design can be your key to delivering this.

Category demand

Some categories, particularly FMCG, demand change. Reinvention is not just about creating stand-out or attracting shoppers; it’s about reflecting new product development too. A new formula or extra ingredient that delivers benefits in spades should be communicated and heroed in a way that is memorable and engaging.  We took this approach for Redex, communicating its fuel saving and engine longevity benefits.

New technology

Technological advancement continues to move at an unprecedented rate, providing new opportunities for brands to reduce production costs but also to innovate with their pack design. Mass customisation is a growing trend and a brand’s ability to personalise packs to customer whim can increase sales and disrupt a market.  ‘Share a Coke,’ which saw people’s names appearing on bottles globally, was marketing genius and one of the brand’s most successful campaigns to date. Sales increased 2% with consumption rocketing from 1.7 to 1.9 billion servings a day.

If you think it’s time to change your pack design, we’d be happy to talk.