Do you drink Coke or Amul flavored milk? Does the packaging mode make any difference to you (cans or pet-bottles are easier to carry 🙂 ) Do you prefer to drink it in a glass bottle, pet-bottle or a can (in Amul’s case a glass-bottle? Rajesh makes a lot of sense when he quotes this in one of his blog-posts – ‘Though packaging is at times considered as the 5th P of marketing mix it has not received the attention it ideally should have.’
I recently bought an iPod shuffle (in the pic) for my Pune based friend. Apart from the quality of music and the usual set of features I am quite impressed with the manner of packaging. The transparent-rectangular box is quite compact and it allows you to see and actually feel the iPod from your eyes. I showed it to a couple of my close-mates who happen to be proud owners of different models of iPods. Now, amazingly their first comment about the box-wrapped gizmo was the change in its ‘packaging’. Both of them expressed their unhappiness with the packaging of their iPods. Understandably they had bought it several months back, but then again it throws a couple of questions in your mind. Is Apple also emphasizing on the packaging quality during the product life-cycle? Perhaps, because of this packaging you aren’t allowed to open it and try some music on the iPod.
Put your thinking caps on as a customer and try to answer the following questions:
I welcome you to join the conversation 🙂
Recommended Reading
Don’t miss-out Rajesh’s two cents here and here. He has quite beautifully highlighted the philosophy and the approach of product packaging in the context of Indian consumer durables. He has also quoted Parachute’s example which is perhaps the best demo. of what packaging innovation can do for a product.
themarketingblog.wordpress.com 
It’s true that the packaging carries a lot of value when packaging luxury perfumes etc. and of course for shippment but I so wish that some companies at least tried to reduce their packaging materials as so much goes to waste.
Here are few of my inferences on the questions.
When you are thinking of product as a whole, smart packaging does play an important role in the product purchase activities. But, not to a large extent. The reason being that, after receiving your product, it is the quality of the product that is going to affect you. Not its packaging.
Packaging, on the other hand, plays an important role when the product is to be shipped from a distant place.
Take an example of shifting your scooter from one place to another by some of the courier companies. Now during such a transaction, it becomes important that what kind of packaging is done by a particular courier company so that at the end of shifting, your bike is not damaged.
Well as a product offering, smart packaging does add to the value proposition of a product, but not to a large extent. It is usually (30-70)%.
70% are the chances that a particular customer would be using the product all his life and not the packaging as a whole. But it does play an important role when the product security is questioned.
Its true that product packaging is important from the marketing and the customer perspective.The importance of product packaging carries a lot of value when it comes to packaging of luxury items like perfumes, accessories or even exotic wines. Before you actually buy a product, what catches your attention is the way a product is placed in the shop. In some way, product display and packaging is related.
Pingback: Apple » The Power of Product Packaging
Pingback: Ipod » The Power of Product Packaging