A recent Admap article written by Katie Ewer looks at the evolving role of food and drink packaging over the last few years. When out and about grocery shopping consumers are often surrounded by countless choices of different food and drink products bombarding them from many angles. Sometimes there can be too much information available to consumers when shopping and their brains simply cannot process everything around them. It is estimated that we are exposed to up to 20,000 media messages on a daily basis, with around 700 of those from brands and services. So packaging must work hard to break through this competitive space and grab consumers’ attention. To deal with this food and drink packaging is being used more and more by companies as a key communication tool to make consumers aware of certain products existence. In his book Inside the Mind of the Shopper, Herb Sorensen has estimated that our brains need to screen out 95% of the information in an average supermarket just to complete the task of finishing our shopping. Therefore packaging plays a key role in getting products noticed by consumers through helping the products to achieve shelf standout.
Due to this desire to be noticed many food and drink companies have been investing heavily in their packaging design in recent years. Companies are striving to meet consumers changing needs so that their product fits in with their consumer’s current lifestyle. This may include food and drink packaging that communicates convenience to adapt to the trend of Busy Lives as described by Bord Bia’s Consumer Lifestyle Trends programme. Or it may include food and drink packaging that is eco-friendly and meets the needs of environmentally conscious consumers which aligns with the Responsible Living trend. Whatever it may be it is clear that the role of food and drink packaging is evolving with a clear aim of enhancing communication to consumers in order to be noticed.
For more information on this article please contact Ciara.Slattery@BordBia.ie
Source: Bord Bia – The Communicative Role of Packaging
