Packaging

Packaging

Packaging

One ink, fourteen

One ink, fourteen

One ink, fourteen

products

products

products

Author

Ricardo Kruger

Author

Ricardo Kruger

Author

Ricardo Kruger

Published

3 December 2025

Published

3 December 2025

Published

3 December 2025

Reading time

8 minutes

Reading time

8 minutes

Reading time

8 minutes

Filed under

Packaging · Print

Filed under

Packaging · Print

Filed under

Packaging · Print

two men sitting at a table with papers and a pen

A range reads as a range when the differences between its members are small, deliberate and always in the same place.

The instinct with a fourteen-product line is to give each one an identity. Fourteen colourways, fourteen illustrations, fourteen artwork files. On a shelf that reads as fourteen companies, and in a warehouse it reads as a minimum order you cannot meet.

Put the variable in one place

Decide early what changes between products and let nothing else move. A name, a number, a single band of colour. Everything structural stays where it is on all fourteen.

The shopper then learns the layout once. Finding the right product becomes scanning one position rather than rereading the whole pack.

Fourteen identities on a shelf read as none.

Let production carry the difference

A two-colour bag printed in a single long run, with the origin carried by a label applied at packing, costs less and moves faster than fourteen artworks. A new product becomes a label change rather than a print job.

This is a design decision made in a print buyer's language. It is also the decision that determines whether the system survives its second year.

Design the worst case first

Pick the longest name, the darkest origin and the smallest format, and lay those out before anything else. If the system holds there, the rest is easy.

Designing the flagship first produces a beautiful pack and a range that breaks on item eleven.

Contents

Related case

Fourteen skincare SKUs held together by one ink and one grid.

Keep reading

Keep reading

Keep reading

One note a month, sent the morning it is published. Nothing else goes to that list.

One note a month, sent the morning it is published. Nothing else goes to that list.

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