Overview
Customers have preconceived perceptions about luxury brands. As shoppers, we assume the term “luxury” refers to designer clothing, jewelry, cars, and home furnishings. Unless they’re tracking consumers through store experiences and showing them proof, they won’t believe how much purchasing decisions about common goods are influenced by luxury packaging design.
This is where the disconnect between beliefs and actions exists. It’s why focus groups are not a strong enough metric for determining whether packaging will perform at its peak. Even consumers who cannot afford a luxurious lifestyle seek extravagance in the products they buy.
This article shows you why high-end packaging can be a purchase driver for almost every CPG category. You will learn how to analyze competitive landscapes to find opportunities where luxury makes you stand out. We discuss where you can appropriately incorporate luxurious elements into your packaging design.
Let’s get started.
Defining Luxury Packaging
To define luxury packaging, you need to meet customers where they are. Each individual’s unspoken definition of luxury is dependent on finances, lifestyle, interests, etc. A hunter defines luxury differently for a pair of Binoculars than for a laptop computer. Why? Because their interest in hunting appeals to items that resonates luxury.
To define luxury product packaging, we need to rid ourselves of a common belief. In practice, this often translates into premium structures such as luxury rigid boxes, which are specifically designed to deliver strength, elegance, and a memorable unboxing experience. Removing the belief that luxury must match what we see on commercials and social media. Disposing of the idea that there is a requirement for luxury products only being made for the rich and famous.
It Begins With Existing Brand Identify
If you’ve decided that premium packaging is a possibility for your product design, then momentarily reflect on your current brand resonance. Consider your existing brand identity and past brand messaging to understand what existing consumers think about your product.
Is your brand ready for the leap to luxury packaging? If so, carry over brand elements that mirror this feel. If not, consider creating a sub brand speaking only to the audience looking for upscale versions of the product that they are purchasing.
Leading With Luxury
What does luxury look like within your competitive landscape? This doesn’t always mean the highest price or the flashiest packaging. Look at smaller considerations such as sustainable packaging. A luxury product with the biggest impact is one that makes the consumer feel special, and this goes beyond glitz and glam.
It might sound counterintuitive to look at your competitors during creative packaging design strategy sessions. However, identifying gaps in purchase drivers is an opportunity to explore areas yet to be considered.
Creating a Luxurious Experience
Those in search of a luxury experience from a product are not traditionally the type to just grab and go. Even before making the purchase, consumers experience the product for an indefinite period. It is during this time that they subconsciously come to appreciate high-quality materials, visual stimuli, and other sensory aspects, making the packaging special. Similar to other industries, such as premium diamond jewelry, this holistic approach to luxury reminds consumers that product presentation signifies quality.
Let’s explore each of those components now.
The Feel of Luxurious Packaging
A luxury feel to your packaging starts with being unique. Sure, you can swipe an idea from another product that expresses luxury, but it never matches the feeling someone gets from a brand-new experience. As you will see, this can take place, but packaging feel is a superb way to distinguish our product from the next.
Explore ideas for making your product stand out, such as embossing with raised or recessed fonts. Consider how you can have the consumer’s fingers travel along the packaging. Identify fonts that remove rigidity from the look and enhance aesthetic appeal.
How the Package Weight Plays A Role
This is not a one-size-fits-all luxury strategy. Some items of luxury are light as a feather, whereas others are as dense as an anvil. The point here is considering how the weight of your packaging enhances the experience.
Again, look to the competition and see what is missing. Then add or take away weight, testing to see how consumers respond.
The Look of the Package
Not every high-end product follows the same theme. In coffee packaging, a matte-finish label design might give a more luxurious look, whereas a foil finish can make a cookbook appear more glamorous. Be it a bottle or a box, the look of your packaging needs to study existing products broadly, yet narrow in on your target audience.
From this point, you can determine what luxury looks like in packaging shape and design.
The Message on the Package
A luxurious approach to product messaging doesn’t mean the tone of voice appeals only to the affluent female. What we need to accomplish with our messaging is to communicate to customers how this product is one of a kind. We designed it specifically for the most interested consumers.
When messaging speaks to their interests and desires, everyone from blue-collar workers to executives appeals to luxury versions of a product.
Referencing eco-friendliness once more, doesn’t it sound luxurious to say “made of sustainable packaging materials”? On the surface, one might not think that sustainable packaging solutions are luxurious. However, in many CPG categories, it’s a purchase driver for luxury goods.
An Important Luxury Packaging Consideration
By now, we’ve sold you on the idea that shifting to luxury design is a good idea, but let’s reel you back in for the moment. If your upscale packaging material doesn’t perform better during product packaging testing, then why spend the money?
Of course, you only know this when testing your packaging in the real world, but do you do this right? Don’t feel guilty if you answered no. We find that many brands (luxurious and otherwise) are unaware of package design testing and believe focus groups are the primary means of data collection.
This isn’t the case at all, and it’s one reason companies we work with perform so well in retail stores. Through our Packaging design process, we test your product in simulated buying environments against your on-shelf competitors.
Admittedly, it isn’t as simple as it sounds. We go to great lengths to ensure the final version of our clients’ packaging is unbeatable against other concepts.
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Luxury Packaging Design Agency
SmashBrand is a data-driven packaging design agency specializing in luxury packaging that drives purchase decisions. We create packaging box systems, from luxury packaging box formats to rigid box structures using premium material and graphic design that builds a lasting impression for every luxury brand at shelf.
Our process integrates strategy, design, and testing into one workflow. We develop and validate custom boxes in real-world shopping contexts, identifying the messaging and visuals that influence choice. Every design decision is grounded in consumer response, ensuring your custom packaging performs consistently across retail environments and drives measurable growth.
Michael is a partner and the Director of Testing and Insights at SmashBrand, where he spearheads SmashBrand's Path to Performance™ process, a proven, data-driven framework designed to put high-performing consumer packaged goods on the retail shelf. In this role, he believes that packaging acts as a product's "front door", and is almost entirely responsible for shaping how consumers perceive and engage with the brand, ultimately determining whether they will buy the product or a competitor. Thus, he defines the testing methodologies SmashBrand uses to optimize packaging designs to align with the brand's strategic vision, ensuring aesthetic appeal and market viability.
With an educational background and an early career in computer engineering, he transitioned into the entrepreneurial space, launching and owning CPG brands and quickly discovering a knack for innovative market strategies. At SmashBrand, Michael leverages this expertise to lead the research team, focusing on a holistic, data-driven approach to market research, product design, and consumer testing. His philosophy centers on the importance of understanding consumer perceptions, a viewpoint he considers vital for the success of any consumer product.
At the core of Michael's approach is an iterative cycle of specific consumer testing and integrating the insights gained directly into the creative process, leading to optimized and high-performing packaging. This commitment to a data-driven strategy ensures that the packaging designs and branding strategies SmashBrand develops are not just based on aesthetic or conceptual appeal but are proven to resonate with consumers. Over the past decade, he has integrated an agile methodology and a proven platform for consumer testing into SmashBrand's entire operational framework, solidifying the agency's reputation for guaranteeing market performance.
With a unique blend of technical skills, entrepreneurial spirit, and consumer insight, Michael Keplinger offers a multidimensional approach to brand development. His ability to connect seemingly unrelated elements for innovation and his commitment to consumer-centric optimization makes him an invaluable asset to SmashBrand and its clientele. Under his leadership, brands don't just imagine the potential success of their consumer products—they experience it.
To book Michael for speaking engagements and podcast appearances, please email hello@SmashBrand.com
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