Creative Healthy Food Packaging Design for Inspiration

Last Updated on October 6, 2023 by DesignerPeople

With the growing pollution, population and unhealthy lifestyle, people are getting more and more concerned about their nutrients intake. Due to the enormous and immediate access to all kinds of information people have surprisingly increased their interest in health care. The new generation’s demands for healthy foods and beverages have also changed the visual codes of packaging design. They are bending more towards the products whose packaging show information on their main panel about caloric values, calories intake or other essential product features, such as quantity of nutrients and calcium they provide. This method has emerged as a virtual way to talk to consumers and to influence their mind significantly. FUF ( FACTS UP FRONT) is the simple and easiest way to get complete information about all nutritional information on the front side of the food and beverages packaging.

Consumers needs have changed, and hence, the brands have changed too. The consciousness of food quality nowadays is very different from the one our ancestors had many years ago when cholesterol, calories, or fat seemed irrelevant as if it did not even existed. Therefore, there is a demand for products that promote nourishment and health. These changes are having a profound impact on the visual norms that is surrounding us.

Foods and beverages have been a part of our life since Ancient ages. Product Packaging is leading a revolution in the constant preference of the consumers, and it is changing persistently to keep pace with the market. We define our consuming habits every time we choose a product over another product. Henceforth, the designs, graphics, shapes, colors, and materials of every package reflect the picture of our daily choices.

Setting New rules for Healthy Packaging

In today’s era, various techniques and topologies are fashioned by renewing old paradigms to align a healthy relationship with the consumers. New categories are refining through innovative Graphic and Structural Design. The main point which is essential in product packaging design is creative designs which can defy traditional laws and can define new rules. Then only you can stand out among the vast quantity of your competitors. Luckily, consumers are savvy and more conscious about design, and they appreciate innovation and, progressively, many design resources, that were unacceptable in the past, have turned entirely valid today. Graphics and Structural Design is highly recognized and add value to the brand.

The challenge of the new era in the original packaging design paradigms is to expose explicit realism. They want to reflect only their real side and do not want to look at what they are not. As like earlier, the designer used to present flawless fruits and vegetables that even looked as if they do not belong to this world, are no longer the object of desire of new consumers. The illustration or photograph should look as real as possible. Nowadays, Imperfection is considered as an honest brand attitude.

Hence, for this purpose, graphic designers and marketing teams need to re- evaluate many innovative visual resources that were well recognized in conventional packaging design. For example, the increasing presence of white background, non-shining materials, and simple logotypes are the most popular individuality of the modern group. The traditional shiny bright colors, the pretentious designs full of glitter and giant logotypes have become old school. Today, the customers are demanding for simple yet elegant designs that depict the reality.

Light Products = Much Healthier

With time, the consuming habits of humans have changed. They have shaped a new preference for diet and redefined the category of products related to health care. As the human body cannot synthesis various essential nutrients which is a source of body nourishment. Nutrients are usually consumed in the form of food, for full-filling the body needs of, protein, carbohydrate, fat, vitamin, mineral, fiber, and water. Earlier people were only concerned about low-calorie products.

But with the growing awareness of humans about nutrition and their interest in functional benefits enforced the creation of brands based on the communication of health more than on weight loss. However, many products are not precisely recommended to lose weight that has been adapted to the new era. This could be done utilizing informative graphics about nutritional values on the main face of the package. Many of them do this to reveal that they are not as caloric as people might think.

The healthy and nutritious food look as tempting, tasty and even healthier as any other product and this is the most crucial matter. The only way to seduce and appeal to the client effectively is by making the innovative decisions of graphics and structural packaging design. Creative Design has the solution to create enhancing and attention-grabbing packaging designs.

The rise of Low-Calorie Products

The past few decades have witnessed the massive demand for low-calorie products. Packaging only reflects the actual image of your product, and being low- calorie, the packaging design of those was usually less attractive and dull. They used to be related to restrictive diets and did not look at all tasty. All Light products used to be a modified version of a regular product. For example, a milk brand had its main product and a Light toned version of the same brand and graphic design, but the only difference was the background color. There was no major concern in making something diverse.

With Time, this trend becomes very popular. The people who were not going on a diet even bought the Light products. Moreover, it has become a habit for them. It is considered to be a smart choice that allows the consumer to eat and repeat. Light products were viewed as an assurance of nature and wellness. This is defining consumer’s way of life, and that is precisely what the marketing teams need to know to identify what the new.

However, the vast demand for Light products has to lead to creating brands exclusively devoted to this category, and they do not have an alternative product for consumers who do not go about counting calories. These brands are meant and addressed for their specific target.

 

Be natural, be honest

Nowadays, Consumers do not want to rely on artificial or chemical ingredients, as artificially synthesized food are considered to have many bad fats. The increasing demand for natural products and massive nutrition quality has also upraised the expectation about packaging design. As it is believed that the first impression is the last impression. So, a low-quality packaging is professed as a bad quality product, no matter what there is inside.

Packaging design is enormously important in creating your brand image and also helps in delivering explicit messages to achieve what the brand wants to communicate. Designers are landing with different strategies new models of communication that will convey the sensation that the product the consumers are buying is not only delicious but also healthy and it will help them to get proper nourishment.

There are many graphics resources in healthy foods and beverages graphic design to achieve its goals. Packaging design creates the promise and makes it visual in an explicit message that goes together with the sensorial experience formed by the shape and material of the package. Shape and materials of a package are also essential to improve a complete multi-sensorial experience and showcases the thoughtfulness of bringing your product to the market aiming to build a brand identity.

Beautiful imperfection

Nowadays, different attractive shades, textures, holographic are used to make the design elegant and more readable. Even the customers are interested more at innovative designs and always appreciate if they found something new and money-spinning. Today, companies don’t limit the end as just an information provider they are trying to serve other purposes for their customers. This strategy is undoubtedly making their product stand out from all other competitors. The new brand strategies of today aim to represent consumers’ interests more than their benefit. They are seeking to build a long-lasting relationship with the consumers by revealing their real site.

PACKAGING INFLUENCES HEALTH CONSCIOUS CONSUMERS

When we are outside pollution is attacking, busy in offices hence no timely consumption of food (while many times we order from the restaurant). During even social gathering we eat all fried and unhealthy food. We hardly have control over any above situations.  Also, if we can control, either case or lack of self-regulating are factors which deviate you.

So when we visit any supermarket for shopping, I am sure that’s the place where we tend to buy fresh food, or we can say a healthier way. We have just 27 secs to make buy or not decision when we hold any packaging. Proper packaging will give you all the relevant information which will impact your health at one glance. Due to massive competition in the food industry, today, gaining competitive advantage is a challenging task. Hence packaging is the best way to communicate with consumers.

Let us study how will packaging elements influence customers for healthy purchase   :

1.Label design insight

67% of consumers face challenges to analyze whether a food product is meeting their needs by looking at the package label.  48% of consumers consider themselves “not at all informed” about a food product even after reading the label.

They are hence creating a massive gap between what consumers actually want to buy and what they are buying. Ingredient details and from where they are sourced plays a very prominent role because consumers today want authentic and right quality ingredients which go into food production.

When we are talking about ingredient sources, packaging with ingredient images and creating its theme on packaging will help customers to understand what is going into the making of this product. Example if we are purchasing Dr Gluten premium wheat flour. Package designing theme should have images of almond, split green gram, jowar, which will help the consumer to get information at a glance.

Highlighting health care ingredients on the packaging is the best way to communicate with health-conscious customers.

Companies can add competitive advantage over brands who are designing just on the basis of images and no strategic story behind it. Specialized printing, illustrative pictures and nutritional values on the front of the pack will help your product to stand out.

2.Dietary restrictions

44% of consumers are having dietary restrictions such as food allergies, sensitivity or intolerance towards a specific set of food. Which can be dairy, gluten, lactose, fructose few are on a vegan diet while others on keto. So packaging should beautifully communicate this message in the form of infographic icons which are easy and fast to understand instead of wasting any time of the customer

3.Colours

 Impact of colours on packaging design also plays a very vital role; each colour in the health sector depicts some prominent meaning. Such as if its green it represents healthy, organic,  natural, eco-friendly which will get merge with consumers value. The dark colour indicates to be expensive, and health-conscious packaging design pattern should be minimalistic. Focusing effectively on key messages and try to communicate health information on packaging without overcrowding. An excellent example of minimalistic design, yet talking relevant nutritional information is RxBar, which is acquired by Kellogg. It is a product using very soft colour so that message should highlight and colour should not overpower the content mentioned on the packaging. Tagline given is also very organic, which says – prescribed by nature, which is associating and enriching your experience of being close to nature. Images of blueberry and overall nutritional value mentioned on the package are efficiently communicating a strong message.

4. Size and portion packaging

According to Punchard and Dudkiewicz, consumers prefer smaller portioned snack items, which help them control their daily calorie intake. These smaller pack sizes acquire a variety of on-the-go packaging applications may be smaller widths for a secure hand-held experience or flexible for safe storage. Japan is a country where people eat in smaller portions, and it is believed to be the actual cause for their long and healthy lifestyle. 

According to Mintel research,

54% of UK consumers agree smaller pack sizes leads smaller in calorie control

40% of German consumers believe that portion-controlled snacks are an excellent alternative to cutting down on sugar intake.

5.    Stand up pouches to maintain freshness

When a health-conscious person is purchasing food products factors such as freshness is very important. Stand up pouches are the best way to sustain the freshness of any product because these pouches have resealable zips which will keep food not only fresh but also away from moisture,  heat, odour and many other environmental factors.

64% of UK snack eaters would prefer purchasing food if its into resealable packaging format.

6. Transparent window packaging

Packaging, which is having a small visible window through which product inside is visible, creates a feeling of authenticity for the consumer.

According to Mintel’s Food packaging trends report, 54% of shoppers see product visibility as an essential factor and 30% of shoppers judge freshness by appearance while connecting freshness with healthiness.

Companys positioning themselves as healthy snacking and by revealing colour, texture and shape, clear packaging can help discerning shoppers assess health claims.

Die-cut window packaging is getting more popular in 2020 because :

Ingredient shape window, funny shape window and name shape window if one has an imagination then he can do wonders with die-cut technique. (hyperlink with old blog die-cut)

7. Sustainability packaging

In the holistic approach, people are very concerned about the drastic ill effects of various pollution, global warming, wastage and many more social issues. Impact of these effects is severe on not only the present generation but also for future generations. So people support and prefer purchasing those brands whose packaging is either recyclable or made by eco-friendly materials which are sourced by natural resources.

Biodegradable packaging are now sought after by consumers as they become more emotionally involved in ecological sustainability. Various food startups have been investing in such packaging. In the Netherlands, there is even a grocery chain committing to provide an utterly plastic-free aisle in all of their locations.

CONCLUSION

Packaging, branding and marketing are various factors through which health-conscious consumers can be communicated easily by applying correct strategies and techniques. Improving consumers lifestyle will challenge brands to enhance their visibility factors. Where customers will not have to invest their time on scrutinizing complete package to get required health-related relevant information. Brands can gain consumers trust and loyalty by incorporating consumers perception and values into the packaging.

 

Author: Megha Malik

As a passionate entrepreneur and creative brand consultant with experience of 14 years in digital, branding and packaging industry, it is my honest effort to put my experiences and knowledge of industry towards readers. A chartered accountant by degree but a marketing personality in blood has motivated her to take in designing industry as a career. With her fun-loving personality and sharp branding skills, she is a great motivational speaker on her YouTube channel, an active member in various business channels offline as well as online. Do connect me personally via my LinkedIn and I love to share my expertise with you.