Overview
Did you know that what our industry considers some of the “best packaging designs” often performs poorly on retail shelves? Winning awards for attractive packaging means nothing if your product does not concretely lead to higher sales. To be blunt, your product packaging design generates reorders or retailer returns.
Do you want to know how to create the “best packaging design” that generates revenues and captures market share? Good, because that’s what we will cover. Continue reading to discover how to implement a packaging design process effectively. In this article, you will learn:
- The elements that make up a best-selling design.
- How to design a brand strategy to support your product.
- The latest packaging design trends and how we feel about them.
- The role of package design testing for CPG and FMCG products.
- Things to consider when creating your initial conceptual designs.
- The SmashBrand packaging design process.
Throughout the article, you will see real-life examples of startups and category leaders who make better-than-good packaging design decisions. These designs contain elements that we believe positively impact consumer intent.
By the time you finish reading, you will have much to discuss with your packaging designer or have booked a time to talk with our packaging design experts.
The traditional CPG packaging design approach.
The traditional structural design approach for CPG product packaging depends on the company’s size. Here’s a look at how consumer packaged goods brands typically look to solve their product design dilemma.
Small Business: Hire a graphic designer or agency to give your product label design a unique look.
Mid-Size Business: Hire an agency or leverage an internal creative team to create a packaging design that aligns with your brand image.
Enterprise: Hire a packaging design firm to support your internal team in creating a product design.
But even though these are the traditional approaches, there are better, more profitable ways to design packaging. Even a small startup with limited capital can craft a brand development strategy, including a packaging design process, that creates more than just a cool-looking package. And you must because your brand will compete against the biggest companies in the most competitive categories.
A “good” look becomes a poor performer if the product next to yours has more of the following:
- An emotional appeal because of your existing brand Resonance.
- Better positioning thanks to the current brand recall from products in other categories.
- A product design that covers more ground with its brand differentiation.
- More impactful purchase drivers to grab a consumer’s attention.
For product packaging to be successful (and your brand to stay in business), take advantage of any opportunity to enhance the performance of your product, especially when the product sits directly in front of a shopper.
The reality of packaging design for FMCG products
The fast-moving consumer goods category presents one of the most competitive landscapes. FMCG product packaging needs to understand this fact. There is a lack of loyalty in today’s distracted society, where consumers are omnichannel shopping for their basic needs.
Retail packaging for these products must assume that consumers have never seen or heard about their brand. While we want to carry over the brand elements that a consumer subliminally recognizes, we shouldn’t lean on their strength for shoppers to make repeat purchases.
Fast-moving consumer goods must continuously resonate with a shopper’s needs and desires. Packaging design for kids’ products needs to make the mom feel better about her parenting choices each time she shops at the store. If another company’s design does this better, expect to lose the sale.
Elements of a winning design.
The three principal components of product packaging design are not mutually exclusive. Many brands effectively execute a design that encompasses these three components. However, the best packaging designs combine all components to strengthen the package’s primary message.
The packaging.
In consumer packaging design, how a product feels in the hand can be just as important as its appearance. Subtle choices such as smooth versus grainy textures, flat versus raised fonts, or wide versus narrow openings can determine whether a customer buys the product or puts it back on the shelf.
Effective package product design goes beyond aesthetics. It considers the whole package experience, blending visual appeal with tactile feedback. This is where the design of product packaging becomes a key driver of sales and conversions.
From early-stage package designing to the final stages of packaging design and production, every decision influences how consumers engage with your brand. Whether you’re exploring graphic design for product packaging or conducting a comprehensive packaging design analysis, remember that packaging design and branding must align with real-world interactions.
Want to know how to design a product package that sells? Start by planning for how it’s held, opened, and experienced because the best packaging is felt, not just seen.
Graphic design.
In the packaging design industry, graphic design is a form of communication. Every visual choice speaks directly to the consumer, shaping perception and influencing buying behavior.
Packaging designers must master the fundamentals of packaging design, including color psychology, typography, layout, and visual hierarchy. These elements aren’t just creative, they’re strategic packaging design considerations that contribute to shelf impact and consumer trust.
For example, if you’re targeting Gen Z, your packaging design concepts should lean playful and vibrant, pairing health-forward messaging with a bold aesthetic. That’s how you visually speak their language.
Successful packaging design strategies align graphic elements with the broader goals of product design and packaging. From packaging design size to how a product fits into a shopper’s lifestyle, every design detail matters in the journey from glance to grab.
Whether you’re refining product packaging and design or starting from scratch, ensure your visual storytelling is purposeful and always performance-driven.
Compelling messages.
Words matter, and most brands’ mistake is looking at product features exclusively through an internal company lens. Regarding product benefits, the language used by you and potential customers may differ. When considering your packaging design copy, maintaining a customer-centric lens prevents subjectivity in the design process.
Designing a brand strategy.
When a brand hires us for packaging design, they receive a fresh perspective on their brand strategy. A brand’s overall structure and theme are affected when launching or redesigning a product. Therefore, a packaging design strategy considers the product and brand in both inclusive and isolated contexts.
Let’s examine some of the key aspects of a brand strategy and how they influence your product packaging design.
Company branding.
Are you launching this product to increase or leverage brand awareness? Sometimes, a product may be more of a branding or packaging design, where it’s about furthering the brand name. Often, this is the case when creating a branded house line extension.
Other times, your branding is less about existing and more about creating. Your brand elements have a limited impact on purchase intent, but you hope that repeat purchases will increase future brand visibility.
Competitive landscape.
The age of your category will, in most cases, indicate the level of competition your brand faces. A brand may create a product in an existing category to enhance its brand identity or position itself as an early adopter in a new, emerging category.
The wrong move adopted by brands in established categories is creating louder packaging designs, in the hope of standing out. Turning the volume up on your product packaging is not a strategic move. It’s an obvious choice that only leads to capturing market share in certain situations.
Buyer persona.
Hopefully, your brand understands its customer archetype, which is the starting point for learning about your ideal consumer’s hopes, fears, interests, and desires. On a product level, you need to understand who is buying this product at a deeper level. Agreement between the consumer and the design elements is how you create shelf interest and prevent competitors from distracting shoppers away from your product.
Product packaging design trends.
Like music, clothing, and art, product packaging trends evolve. Often, these trends repeat themselves. Awareness of these trends (and their lifecycle) is a conversation to have with your team and the agency helping you design your product.
Here’s a look at the current trends and packaging inspiration from some of the most popular brands.
Sustainable packaging.
Sustainable packaging refers to the use of packaging that has a positive impact on our planet. While the media discussion is about 10 times greater than industry acceptance, brands continue to view sustainability as a way to differentiate themselves from the competition.
Custom packaging.
Gen Z is all about personalization; even if the message is one-to-many, they still want the packaging to cater to their needs. Custom packaging is one way to cater to this customer demographic and enhance the overall user experience. Whether using unique packaging material or providing a solution to a problem, every brand must have a conversation about how to stand out with custom packaging.
Functional packaging.
The definition of functional packaging varies depending on the product and the target consumer demographic. Functional packaging is designed to integrate into the consumer’s lifestyle seamlessly. The starting point for creating functional packaging is to ask, ‘How can I make this packaging more straightforward to use now and over time?’
Minimalist packaging.
Minimalist packaging design is a popular choice by digitally native companies. However, since DTC is dead for most FMCG products, the moment these concepts hit store shelves, they need a lifeline when competing against strategically designed products.
The benefit of minimalist packaging is creating white space for the right messages to shine, but you have a product that consumers won’t connect with without messaging.
Package design testing.
While familiar with market research, only some brands recognize the need to test packaging for optimal shelf performance. Unfortunately, when competing at the highest level, the majority need more than market research to guarantee success. Product package testing, where you measure your design against a real-life competitive landscape, provides a clear understanding of its impact.
Considerations for your product packaging design.
Just because packaging fits your product and your buyer persona doesn’t mean it’s the best one for your brand. There are other companies and retailers to consider before making our final packaging design. Here are a few questions to ask your team and agency about a design.
What is the risk that I will struggle with the supply chain?
Stockouts hurt. But delays caused by your packaging? That puts your entire supply chain and your retail relationships at risk. An overlooked packaging design concept can disrupt everything from sourcing to fulfillment. That’s why your packaging system design must align with your production capabilities and timelines. Functional packaging design ensures your packaging works efficiently within your supply chain.
The best product packaging integrates both form and function. When you learn packaging design with a focus on packaging and product design, you reduce the chance of bottlenecks and costly reworks.
Following precise packaging design guidelines and aligning your brand and packaging design with operational realities gives you a strategic edge. It’s not just about packaging design ideas; it’s about delivering a product and packaging design that performs under pressure, every time.
What is the lifespan of your product package design?
While packaging trends shift and shopper preferences evolve, a well-executed product packaging design should hold its value well beyond a single season. But how long can you count on it to last, and when is it time to rethink?
The answer depends on how well your design adapts to changing industry standards, sustainability demands, and retail dynamics. Packaging engineers now consider factors such as packaging waste, the use of recycled materials, and the long-term viability of plastic packaging versus cardboard alternatives. These considerations directly impact how your package performs on the shelf and in consumers’ hands.
Your label design may remain visually relevant, but if it doesn’t align with emerging values or functional needs, its shelf life is shortened. The best approach? Build with longevity in mind, while remaining adaptable to future evolution.
Will you need secondary packaging?
Will your packaging design work for both inner packaging and outer packaging? As your brand grows, additional product placement opportunities will present themselves. Even if secondary packaging isn’t a part of your initial design, consider the future growth of your product and whether the design is transferable to other types of packaging.
Do you have product & packaging alignment?
In food packaging, perception sets expectations. If your product looks too good to be true and doesn’t deliver on taste, texture, or sweetness, your customer experience takes a hit.
That’s why designing packaging isn’t just about standing out on the store shelf. It’s about truthfully representing what’s inside. Whether you’re working with a graphic designer on a cardboard box or exploring new packaging design ideas, your custom packaging design must align with the real product experience.
A well-executed packaging solution combines compelling box design with honesty and clarity, because overpromising with visuals only undermines trust. Transparency isn’t just ethical, it’s essential to performance.
The SmashBrand product packaging design process.
While we cannot reveal our packaging design agency’s secret sauce, here’s a look at the categories that summarize the 340+ steps in our packaging design process. Every brand should follow these steps before making a final design decision.
Brand strategy & market research.
In our packaging design process’s brand discovery phase, we discover insights about category dynamics, consumer perceptions, and competitive purchase drivers. Our team presents data to help guide the conversation.
- Consumer & retail immersion interviews to determine what’s working and what needs to change in future product packaging.
- Purchase a driver’s research that puts the consumer at the forefront of strategic planning.
- A direct consumer study of over 600 targeted consumers to determine attitudes, preferences, and expectations about your product category.
- Conduct in-store competitive market audits that create a visual roadmap, uncovering opportunities to stand out.
- Purchase driver message research to develop messaging criteria that drive higher adoption and create substantial differentiation.
- Pack Speak™ consumer testing & scoring measures the effectiveness of different communication directions, purchase drivers, their priority, and the hierarchy of messaging themes.
- Conduct a style path, an expansive exploration of creative routes, and a comprehensive examination of innovative packaging design directions. This discovery phase helps to identify a high-performing design.
Package design testing.
With a detailed understanding of your brand, consumer demographic, and competitive landscape, it’s time to start designing and testing your product packaging. Each step in this process gets us closer to a design optimized for peak shelf performance.
- Initial screening with over 600 target consumers of various design concepts through our gut check testing and diagnostic feedback methodology.
- Packaging design system & structural concepts based on all research and learning up to this point.
- Conduct distinctive assets & uniqueness scoring analysis against all competitors for each design element.
- Begin our Preformance™ concept test & scoring process, which tests consumers randomized to eliminate pre-exposure bias found in traditional design research.
- Continue optimizing the packaging design system by testing the top designs against one another to identify the most essential front panel messages and determine their optimal placement.
- The final step is our Performance™ purchase intent testing and scoring, which provides you with accurate data to support your design. The result will give you and retailers confidence about your brand’s performance on the shelf.
Final concept delivery.
Our rigorous, data-backed process removes the guesswork from design. By the time we deliver the final concept, every element from structural design to messaging hierarchy has been validated for market performance. No more second-guessing white space, value propositions, or clarity of communication.
With SmashBrand, you’re not just getting a professional designer, you’re getting a proven path to ROI. Our packaging solutions maintain brand consistency, integrate seamlessly with custom box formats, and are designed to meet the evolving demands of the packaging industry, including sustainable options such as recycled plastic. From printing precision to shelf-ready impact, every detail is engineered to perform.
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Data-driven product packaging design agency.
From conception to final design, SmashBrand is a strategic product packaging agency that helps your brand outperform retail store competitors. Our methodology prioritizes data over design, ensuring your finished look is guaranteed to stand out on the shelf. Book a time to discuss your project with our team.
Kevin Smith is the founder of SmashBrand, a brand development agency specializing in the CPG and FMCG sectors. Under Kevin's guidance, SmashBrand seamlessly integrates brand strategy, design, and detailed consumer testing, ensuring impactful market outcomes and enhanced sales velocities for its clients.
Key milestones in his career:
Before establishing SmashBrand, Kevin ventured into entrepreneurship with Nutri-Sport at 21. Recognizing the untapped potential in sports nutrition, he rapidly expanded to seven retail locations within a year. This success led to the formation of a distribution company serving all nutrition stores throughout Arizona.
Subsequent ventures included pioneering e-commerce stores and launching Athletic Xtreme, a globally distributed sports nutrition brand. Notably, Athletic Xtreme won BodyBuilding.com's Brand of the Year in 2006 and found its place on the shelves of major retailers, from GNC and Vitamin Shoppe to Walmart successfully exiting in 2014.
Apart from brand milestones, Kevin's journey includes commendable service as a Marine Corps veteran, where he was honored as a DOD Marine of the Year in 2001.
While leading SmashBrand and investing in budding brands, Kevin is committed to mentoring aspiring CPG entrepreneurs. His profound industry knowledge, from grasping retail trends to understanding shelf dynamics, serves as invaluable guidance for brands striving to carve out their niche.
Central to Kevin's approach is a consistent philosophy: Marry actionable, data-centric findings with proven strategies to ensure brands stand out and succeed in retail.
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