A Complete Handbook of Food Packaging Ideas

The food business has more potential to succeed due to never-ending food demand. This industry is also the largest manufacturing sector in the world, which means you can also get tough competition if you run a food business. 

This is why you should look for factors other than food taste that help make your brand different. One of the factors is knowing the food packaging ideas and getting the one that aligns with your brand image and product needs. 

This blog has highlighted the different types of food packaging and design ideas so that you can pick the one that suits your business interest. Read More!

Significance of Custom Food Packaging

Before digging into details, understand how customization has made packaging a significant factor for business growth. The direct contact of food with packaging material and its impact on human health made it important for food business owners to get food-grade packaging. Custom food packaging should qualify for the safety standards set by the FDA. If you customize food-grade and contamination-free packaging, you can get the following benefits:

• Grabs customers' attention.
• Increases your brand awareness.
• Ensures safe food delivery to your customers. 
• Shows your concern for environmental safety. 
• Protects food from oxidation, moisture, and air pollutants.

Top 10 Food Packaging Design Ideas

The design you choose for your product packaging plays an important role in impressing customers. Packaging design also influences the customers’ purchasing decisions. Let’s discuss some persuasive food packaging design ideas :

• Bold Food Packaging 

This design features vibrant colors, bold typography, and geometric patterns. Bold packaging design is all about highlighting important branding elements like logo or name with the help of large and eye-catching typography. 

Using the right typography helps increase brand awareness. Brightly coloured snack packs with oversized logos are the best example of bold design for food packaging. Another amazing example is energy drinks with neon colors, bold brand name typography, and geometric shapes.

• Playful Food Packaging

The playful design features interactive elements, bright colors,  quirky typography, and hand-drawn or digital cartoon artwork. Interactive elements could be peel-off stickers,pop-out characters, or wordplay that help engage customers. 

Another approach to make your food packaging playful and engaging is to keep it raw-looking. Cereal boxes are usually made on a playful design theme. Most juice boxes are also made with interactive game elements to engage customers.

• Vintage Food Packaging

Vintage-style packaging is based on retro designs, nostalgia, and historical trust.  The use of rustic colors in this type of food packaging design gives a vintage base for such packaging. Consider using kraft paper to make vintage or rustic food grade packaging. 

When designing vintage packaging, choose warm colors like earthy brown, distressed or Serif fonts, and retro illustrations. Classic cereal boxes with faded fonts and nostalgic messages are a good example of vintage food packaging. Likewise, antique spice jars designed on the theme of any memorable bygone era are also examples of vintage or retro packaging. 

• Artistic Food Packaging

The artistic food packaging design is based on monochromatic, contrasting or vibrant color schemes. It also features  Hand-draw or custom art, hand-lettering, or creative typography. This packaging design also helps your brand improve storytelling. 

You can also use custom shapes to design artistic food packaging. For example, exotic mylar bags in different shapes are made with artistic design. You can also use 3d fonts to add an artistic touch to your food packaging. 

• Funky Food Packaging 

Funky design features electric colors, unusual patterns, unconventional typography, and groovy design characters. You can incorporate funky designs on all types of food packaging whether it is a mylar bag or cardboard box.

Cereal boxes with funny cartoon characters and large-sized unconventional typography are examples of funky food packaging. Juice boxes and snack packs are mostly made on funky design themes to attract customers. 

• Seasonal-Themed Food Packaging 

Upgrade your food product packaging with contemporary trends and occasions. Packaging designs based on seasonal themes are mostly made using characters, typography, and color schemes that align with the occasion. For example, leverage the holiday season to make Christmas-themed food packaging to attract and excite customers. 

Food boxes and bags with Christmas, Halloween, Thanksgiving, and New Year themes are examples of seasonal packaging. You can also boost your sales using such packaging`.

• Minimalistic Food Packaging

Minimalistic design features neutral colors, simple patterns, ample white space, and minimum embossing or debossing. Minimalistic food packaging can be made using natural materials such as kraft paper, cardboard, and rigid stock. 

Rigid food boxes are mostly made with a minimalistic design theme. Kraft paper is also used for making minimalist food packaging due to its subtle natural brown. 

• Movie-Themed Food Packaging

Upgrade food packaging with film-inspired graphics, cinematic color schemes, and iconic movie characters. This design features cinematic fonts such as Sans Serif Typefaces, and colors such as blue, teal, orange, and yellow.

Popcorn boxes are examples of movie-themed food packaging. Some snacks made with film strip patterns are also made with film-themed. Energy drinks with cinematic patterns like cameras, movie strips, popcorn and posters are the best examples of movie-themed food packaging. 

• Humorous Food Packaging

Humorous design features silly scenarios, sarcastic tones, puns, funky typography, and cartoon illustrations. These food packaging designs can also be made using viral funny memes and characters to grab customers’ attention. 

Adding witty warnings with colorful typography makes your food packaging more creative and humorous. For example, you can add a funny disclaimer on the cookie boxes as “guilt-free cookies”. Likewise, snacks with punny names are examples of humorous food packaging.

•  Manga-Inspired Food Packaging 

Food packaging designed with an anime theme looks attractive and impresses customers. According to HEADPHONES ADDICT,  2.88 billion people globally watch anime, which shows how anime is becoming an important part of today’s culture. 

You can use manga-inspired designs for your food packaging to connect with your customers. The best example is one of the largest food chains McDonald’s has recently launched McDonald’s Manga Packaging for anime fans.

5 Types of Aesthetically Functional Food Packaging

As a small business owner, you should know about different types of food packaging to choose the one that aligns with your brand image. You can choose the right packaging for packing and presenting your products according to your food niche. 

The following are some major types of packaging that are further categorized according to their features and materials :  

Sustainable Packaging

One of the major concerns of every food business owner is to get sustainable and eco-friendly packaging. This concern is valid as consumers prefer buying sustainably packaged food items. A survey shows that 53% of Americans would pay 1-3% more for sustainably packaged food. Some types of sustainable packaging are as follows:

• Paper Packaging

This is commonly used sustainable packaging made from paper fibers, wood pulp, and paperboard. Some popular types of paper-based packaging are cardboard , kraft paper, corrugated cardboard, and rigid stock. 

• Plant-Based Plastic

Various food businesses started discontinuing the use of plastic packaging due to its negative impact on the environment. Therefore,bio-plastic was discovered. 

Plant-based plastic is made from fermented plants such as starch of corn, sugarcane, bamboo, and other plants. The plastic made from plant starch biodegrades the way plants do.

• Sugarcane Packaging

As the name suggests, this type of packaging is made from sugarcane plants. It is made from fibrous parts of sugarcane which is called bagasse. When the juice is completely extracted, the leftover part is used as a raw material for sugarcane packaging.

It is a perfect sustainable packaging solution for food businesses. Sugarcane packaging could also be used as an alternative to paper-based packaging to prevent deforestation. 

• Mushroom Packaging

It is also called mycelium packaging. Its making process involves the cleanliness of agricultural waste to prepare a substrate. Mycelium is the root part of mushrooms mixed with substrates such as hemp Hurd. It is good for food businesses looking for sustainable yet food-grade packaging.

Edible Packaging

You should know about edible packaging for food for your business as it is used to wrap and pack food items like candies, fruits, gummies, and baked food items packaging. This packaging is made from seaweed, algae, rice paper, fruit peels, and other plant extracts. Therefore, it is safe to consume. Some other edible  examples used as retail food packaging supplies are:

• Edible Cups
• Edible Straws
• Ice Cream Cones
• Plates and Bowls
• Rice Wafer Paper

Smart Packaging

As a small food business owner, one of your concerns might be maintaining the freshness of food items. You should consider smart packaging to add innovation to your business. Smart packaging helps maintain the freshness of food, prolongs the shelf life of products, and enhances the user experience. Following are a few types and features of smart packaging:

• Active Packaging

 An example is alcoholic drinks containing oxygen absorbers that help extend the shelf life of drinks.

• Freshness Indicators

Biosensors attached to food items are used to inform customers about food expiration and freshness conditions. 

• Connected Packaging

QR Codes, Sensors, Bar codes, and tags that enhance the customer experience and ensure products’ authenticity.

• Intelligence Packaging

Sensory stickers attached to frozen foods are one of the best examples. These stickers change their colors with temperature changes. 

• Time Temperature Indicators

TTIs tell you that you are mishandling the product if you try to freeze food that is not good for frozen use.

Read more about Packaging design trends on DesignRush

Flexible Packaging

This type of food packaging is widely used in the form of kraft paper and cardboard. As the name suggests, it is flexible, unlike rigid boxes. Some flexible food packaging bags are made from mylars for long-term food storage due to their excellent barrier properties.
Most food businesses use kraft paper bags due to their food-grade properties to pack food items like burgers, fries, patties etc. The following are some popular types of flexible food packaging:

• Bags 
• Liners
• Wraps
• Pouches
• Mylar Bags

All types of flexible food packaging can be styled differently according to user convenience and product needs. 

Tin Food Packaging 

Various food brands also use tin containers to pack products like cookies, chocolates, cold drinks and processed foods. Tin food packaging is made from steel coated with thin tin plates that are best known for their corrosion-resistant properties. The following are some types of tin food packaging:

• Tin Jars
• Tin Sliders
• Round Tin Boxes With Lid
• Tin Cans (Cylindrical, Square, Rectangular)

Conclusion!

Choosing the right food packaging helps increase food longevity, ensure protection, and leave a lasting impression on the customers. All this can be achieved only if you get enough information about all types of food packaging. 

After reading this blog, you can easily choose the packaging that aligns with your products and brand image. If you need more assistance with food packaging, reach out to us. We would be happy to assist you!