Anatomy of a Winning Package Design

by David Brier

“Don’t wreck a sublime chocolate experience by feeling guilty. Chocolate isn’t like premarital sex. It will not make you pregnant. And it always feels good.”
― Lora Brody

“In most people’s vocabularies, design means veneer. It’s interior decorating. It’s the fabric of the curtains of the sofa. But to me, nothing could be further from the meaning of design. Design is the fundamental soul of a human-made creation that ends up expressing itself in successive outer layers of the product or service.” Steve Jobs

The Wrong Sequence

Some companies place package design as something that comes later, after all the R&D and product development.

But why would one do such a thing when it’s often the first thing a customer encounters either on a shelf or online or when they get home to unwrap “their reward” they gave to themselves?

As the late Steve Jobs stated above, design is so much more than the veneer. Brands that crush it know that.

It gives meaning and dimension to what a brand believes and stands for.

The Hierarchy of a Label

I’ve done my share of package design, from Botanical Bakery to Glob Colors to Undew skin care to water.

What’s missed by too many products and brands is this crucial fact:
so much of a brand is SEQUENCE.

• What do you want them to read first?
• Second?
• What’s important?
• What’s trivial?
• Does the design support all of that?
• Does it engage the customer?

Having recently completed this new product line for Legacy Chocolates, I decided to create this diagram to help anyone looking to understand WHY you put certain in certain places to help ensure the customer see what you want you want them to see in an exact sequence.

For Those Not in Minnesota

If you’re really into fine chocolate, you probably hate me by now unless you’re in Minnesota.

That’s fair. I’d probably feel the same way.

So, understanding you might hate me more, here is the product line with closeups so you can see better what was done and what was said:

In these details, notice what catches your eye first. It’s not the top item, but the product itself using color and scale:

And no story would be complete without “the proud parents” Mark and Lorraine of this new complete line of chocolate indulgences:

Tagged as: branding, legacy chocolates, package design, steve jobs

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Recipient of over 320 national and international design and branding recognitions and awards, David Brier is an award-winning brand identity designer, author, and branding expert. His firm’s work has won the admiration of peers and organizations but has, more importantly, helped clients jump-start their brands in new and innovative ways, even (and especially) when they’ve failed in previous brand makeovers.

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Originally published at www.risingabovethenoise.com