Essentra Packaging - A lasting first impression

Handling a new product is the first step towards creating an enduring connection between a consumer and a brand. Packaging specialist Essentra explains how its bespoke approach ensures a positive initial response while reducing waste and guarding against counterfeiting.

As awareness of issues such as global warming, waste and our throwaway culture grows, designers are increasingly concerned with creating sustainable products. In addition to being physically robust and long-lasting, products must now be 'emotionally durable': a connection with a product ought to be so deep that a consumer won't want to dispose of it. This is not limited to the object itself and can be extended to everything around it, including its packaging.

Essentra believes that the first physical contact a consumer has with a product is crucial. This initial interaction sets the stage for a relationship that will extend beyond the moment of discovery, so packaging must be thoughtfully designed to appeal on a personal level, engaging the consumers' senses.

This is particularly important for beauty or perfume products, as consumers often choose whatever is most aesthetically pleasing. Fragrances are particularly interesting, as people often like to keep and display empty bottles in their homes.

A bloom of one's own

In order to develop its creative and design abilities, Essentra opened its Design Hub service last year at its premises in Newport in the UK. This brings together creative designers with backgrounds in marketing and branding with packaging and development experts.

Through industry research, innovation sessions, creative workshops, competitor audits and short-run prototype making, the team is able to develop cutting-edge, bespoke designs for every client. Every one incorporates aesthetic features including colour, structure, embossing, debossing, varnishes, foiling and micro-perforations, as well as world-leading security.

The Lotus Pack is an example of the sort of packaging of which the Design Hub is capable. This 'blooming', flower-shaped carton is encased in a clear, acetate pyramid, and includes hot and cold foiling, varnishing, soft-touch finishing and Holosense holographic effects to enhance the luxurious aesthetic. The current popularity of floral motifs in the beauty industry helps the Lotus Pack brings luxury to secondary packaging.

It is secured with Essentra's new tamper-evident lollipop label, which protects against counterfeiting and diversion. When opened, the label reveals a void, chequered substrate, which makes it immediately obvious if the pack has already been opened. Additional information is provided by means of a peel-to-read label, enabling brands to provide more information without compromising space, or the size of the packaging.

Long-term relationship

Aesthetic features, security tools, speciality labels, windowing capability and structural design enable the Lotus Pack to embody Essentra's expertise - in everything from design and manufacturing to research and trend-spotting - in a single package.

By regularly reviewing the industry and monitoring packaging trends, Essentra is constantly developing its ideas in order to meet the needs of the market, whether this is to produce effective anticounterfeiting labels, or designing beauty/personal care packaging that encourages long-term attachment among consumers.

As the Lotus Pack shows, brands can reap the benefits of working with a 'one-stop shop', and Essentra is perfectly poised to create ideal, bespoke packaging that connects with consumers for its customers' products.