Can Your Packaging Affect Sales?

Packaging is more than just a vessel to hold products in. It serves a wide range of purposes and clever packaging design can strongly influence a consumer’s decision to buy it or not. Here are some top reasons how packaging can affect product sales.

Stand out from the crowd

Take a trip to your local supermarket and you’ll soon see how important packaging is for influencing sales. When you’re confronted with rows of shelves of similar products, aside from price, one of the biggest influencing factors for choosing a particular item is what it looks like from the outside. Eye-catching, attractive packaging is more appealing than bland packaging, so if you want people to pick your products then make your packaging stands out from the crowd.

The power of colours

Many people make purchasing decisions at a sub-conscious level, ie, they don’t really think about why they buy something. Often, there are elements of a product’s packaging that can invoke certain feelings with consumers that can in turn influence decision-making. For instance, colours used in packaging can produce various impressions. Earthy colours such as browns or greens often signify wholesomeness, and are good choices of packaging colours for those seeking natural, organic or quality products. Bright, cheerful colours are often used in packaging for products aimed at children. Try to use colours in your packaging that reflect the image you want to portray of your product.

Quality materials

The materials you use to package your products in can say a lot about the quality of your goods. Strong, sturdy packaging materials that can withstand the rigours of transportation, storage and fluctuations in temperatures, light and humidity will stand the test of time, compared to poor quality materials. Flimsy packaging that doesn’t do its job properly will only result in complaints and will less likely result in repeat purchase.

As well as using good quality packaging materials, consumers these days highly regard those forms of packaging that adhere to environmentally friendly policies. So, for example, packaging made from recycled products or packaging that can be easily recycled after use, or can be used for other purposes is given high value by consumers, and gives the impression that the producer of the product cares.

Information

The packaging of your product shouldn’t just satisfy criteria for storing it and looking pretty, but it needs to give consumers information about what it holds inside. Unless your packaging is clear or see-through, consumers are totally reliant on what it says on the outside as to what the product inside is all about.

Clear and concise information is vital to ensure consumers are given all the information they need to know about the product. When making purchases, many people are limited by time, so you need to produce enough attention-grabbing product information on the packaging, without going over-board. As well as choosing different styles of fonts and type sizes to get the information across, make sure it fits in well with the overall design of the product. Information should be easy to find and laid out well. Consumers are increasingly reliant on using information on packaging to ascertain health and nutrition details, so make sure this is easy to understand.

Never, ever give information that is false about what the product does or offers you. It can seem tempting to exaggerate details on the packaging in order to encourage a sale, but it doesn’t work like that. Consumers will only end up feeling disappointed by the false claims, leading to lack of repeat purchase and even complaints.

Written by B. Frisby for UK Packaging.com.