When Packaging Becomes Smarter!

By Claire Virazels, Marketing Manager Production Colour & Packaging Technology, Xerox Europe
This post originally appeared on the Xerox Passerelles Digitales blog, and has been adapted below in English. 

Safe and stable: Two adjectives that perfectly describe the packaging market. But beyond this relative “steadiness”, the industry is going through major changes, in large part, due to the evolution of consumer habits.
In fact, packaging is more than ever subjected to the frantic pace of mass consumption, with the lifespan of products becoming more and more limited. In the same way, the number of variants of a product are increasing, which requires that packages should be adapted to each configuration. “High-tech” equipment and those of mobile telephony are illustrative examples of these consumer goods bound to develop rapidly and along with their packaging.
But beyond these changes intrinsic to the market, packaging has also become smarter!

In addition to its primary function, packaging has become a key element to fight counterfeiting and to secure products. Some packaging is capable of tracking products that are likely to be stolen or counterfeit, while others include safety measures capable of certifying the origin of a product.
For marketing, packaging has also become a way of interacting with the consumer through technologies such as QR codes and Augmented Reality.
These many examples illustrate very clearly the changes that are taking place in the world of packaging – changes that come with the printing industry.
 
For optimization and saving purposes, it has been imperative for the supply chain to redesign and produce the right quantity at the right time. In a sector where printers were once producing in large quantities, the market now sets a new rule that is to produce in much shorter runs, often less than 10,000 boxes!
To meet these new challenges, digital printing technology offers undeniable advantages to efficiently face the new market obligations. By providing print quality more and more close to that of offset technology, digital printing offers the flexibility required today in the business of packaging. Today, a printer can, in a single day, manage the production and finishing of 10 to 12 different designs of boxes. A move simply inconceivable with any other form of technology!
The sector is at the dawn of a new era, the final contours of which have not yet been defined. Even if it is difficult to anticipate future needs in a fast paced changing world, the market must respond to new consumer habits and the new challenges facing brands in innovating with cutting-edge solutions.