Articles
Adding Value by Creating the Future
I think we can all agree that the ability to predict the future would be pretty profitable. We'd have tomorrow's lottery numbers, we'd see what our competitors were up to, and we'd know where to put our money to make a bundle in the stock market. Because we can't predict the future, though, our best bet is to create it.
Does this sound like New Age nonsense to you? "Create your own reality"? Well, if you think about it, it really does make sense. You can think creatively to create packaging that anticipates your users' needs, applies existing and emerging technologies in new ways, and adds value to your offerings. Adding value means different things to different people, but, specifics aside, it is the magical element that can set you apart from the competition and strengthen your relationships with your customers.
Rethinking your packaging, delivery system, or shelf presence is a way to add value. If you can design a package that's so different and so irresistible that people are lining up to get it, you have added value to your offering. If you can create a way to make it dramatically easier for the consumer to use your product, you have added value. If you can anticipate the public's wants and needs and then design a packaging solution that answers them before you're asked, you have added value. (This is what we used to call "thinking outside the box," but in this case, we're rethinking the entire box itself.) You can do it---but sometimes you might need a little outside perspective.
A packaging partner can help you look at your challenges in fresh ways and figure out how to develop solutions that nobody else has thought of before. Here's an example: one of our clients manufactures and distributes a chemical used during certain podiatry treatments. This chemical is serious stuff—it is very aggressive, and everybody has to exercise the utmost caution in its presence. Making matters worse, it was offered in the most inconvenient and dangerous package imaginable: a big glass bottle. We helped this manufacturer develop a premeasured single-dose delivery system with an integrated applicator. No more opening the glass bottle (thereby exposing the patient and physician to danger), locating the correct size applicator(s), trying to determine the correct saturation amount to apply and then performing the procedure. Now, it's all in one convenient package. Better yet, the product itself is more stable because it isn't continually exposed to the environment. The doctor presses down on the hermetically sealed single-dose applicator---and that's it. Our client is the only manufacturer offering this added value package to their industry. I bet you can guess which supplier most podiatrists now turn to for this particular application.
