Box Vox

packaging as content

November 7, 2011

Polyhedral Butter Pack Patent

PolyhedralButterPack

Albert Lowenfel, president of the Hotel Bar Butter Company until retiring in 1955, is credited with having invented the butter carton. (Prior to that, it was sold by the pound from large tubs.)

He began to sell butter in 1931 under a brand name and in quarter pound sticks. It took 10 years for the packaged butter to catch on.

from Albert Lowenfels’ obituary in the Norwalk Hour, June 5, 1969

One of Lowenfels’ inventions that did not catch on was the triangular, prism-shaped carton above. (See also: Close Packing)

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

November 4, 2011

Packaging as Prom Theme

DressesLeft: conceptual Tide dress photo by Ryan Yoon, styling by Hissa Igarashi (via MKTG); middle: Katell Gelebart’s Little Friskies coat; right: Frank Sorbier’s 2010 recycled wrappers dress

It’s high-concept/high-fashion to dress models in recycled packaging, but the same idea has been a popular prom theme for some time now…

PromTop left: DuctTapeRockStar’s Doritos bag prom dress; top right: StrawberryOrange’s “recycled prom dress”; middle: Gondabo’s Coke can tuxedo (“Yeah, I made my prom tux out of coke cans… because I'm just that cool…”); bottom left: Molly Burt-Westvig’s Skittles wrapper prom dress; bottom right: AnnieMarie88’s Starburst wrapper prom dress

(See also: Packaging as Wardrobe)

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

November 3, 2011

Medicinal Marijuana Package Design Makeover

IncrediMeds.Agave

Bay Area Green Cross Dispensary, Inc. has recently rebranded their “medical cannabis” product line with a new registered trademark and a new packaging design…

“in response to revised labeling and packaging guidelines issued by the San Francisco Department of Public Health (DPH). The new labels are designed to better inform users that the product is medicine, not food, and to make the product unattractive/unappealing to children.

Incredimeds-freshly-baked-85336917

I’m not sure I agree that the new branding is strictly medicinal. The “freshly baked” tagline puts this logo somewhere between the baked goods section of a supermarket and stoner-culture comedy films like “Half-Baked.”

Also in the same press release is this:

“Our new packaging complies with the new regulations, enhances safety, and integrates the flare and style that The Green Cross is known for.”

In this context, I can’t quite decide whether the use of “flare” (rather than “flair”) is an inadvertent malapropism or an oblique reference to “lighting up. Although it could also refer to a “flare up” of glaucoma or some other medical condition requiring the use of Incredimeds brand medical cannabis.

Tea

More information here: Medical Cannabis Edibles —(but no mention the package designer).

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

November 2, 2011

Anthropomorphic Light Beer

Another anthropomorphized package: the Bud Light Beer bottle costume from the 2009 “Bud Light Golden Wheat” campaign. This spot is entitled “Persistence.” (via: Anonymous Content)

See also: Packaging Costumes

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

November 1, 2011

Food Stamp Beer Photos

FoodStampBeer

While looking for Ballantine XXX Ale bottles for a post last month, I found the illicit-looking photo in the upper right corner.

From a series of photographs by Brayden Olson for Vice Magazine. I like the paparazzi flash and intestinal-pink* backgrounds of these photos, but I have some misgivings about the article it illustrates. Apparently it’s possible at certain bodegas in NYC to get around the regulations prohibiting the use of food stamps to purchase alcoholic beverages.

“… since receipts at most bodegas in Brooklyn aren’t itemized and products in the store are never scanned (most likely because they are thieves), there is no way to tell what you actually bought.”

“Food Stamp Beer Reviews” Vice

I cringe to think of this article being used to punch more holes in the already tenuous social safety net. With unemployment so high, the demographic of food stamp recipients has clearly changed.

Food policy experts and human resource administrators are quick to point out that the overwhelming majority of the record 38 million Americans now using food stamps are their traditional recipients: the working poor, the elderly and single parents on welfare.

But they also note that recent changes made to the program as part of last year’s stimulus package, which relaxed the restrictions on able-bodied adults without dependents to collect food stamps, have made some young singles around the country eligible for the first time.

Hipsters on food stamps, by Jennifer Bleyer
Salon, March 15, 2010

If “unemployment” can somehow still be viewed as a character defect in the minds of those who have recently characterized the Occupy Wall Street protesters as “unemployed, uneducated and uninformed” — this bodega beer thing may eventually wind up on Fox News as a way of discrediting these new, younger food stamp recipients and food assistance programs in general.

Randy Ludacer
Beach Packaging Design

A footnoted digression: *The color “intensinal pink” is not my own invention. My father coined this term to describe the color of my grandmother’s house on Long Island.

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