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Low-profile, soft-grip package opens new markets

O’Keeffe’s Co., Inc., Sisters, OR, has tapped more deeply into target markets for its hand and foot crème balm products by introducing alternative packaging for the hardware/home center channel.

Pw 11156 O Keefes

Instead of the standard cosmetics-type double-walled high-profile white polypropylene containers used for sales at pharmacies O’Keeffe’s has brought out low-profile brightly colored translucent light-gauge polypropylene jars (3.76-mil sidewalls and 2-mil bottoms) with heat-transfer labels and soft-grip (rubberized around the lip edge) easy-open (one-quarter turn) easy-reclose lids. The product names “Working Hands” and “Working Feet” are displayed prominently in bold red colors on the lid tops. The containers hold 3.4 oz of product.

Spearheaded by O’Keeffe’s president Tara O’Keeffe-Broadbent who developed the new package design and CAD drawings the new flatter-profile injection-molded packaging (produced by a China-based container manufacturer) enables quicker more efficient cooling of the hot-filled cremes. This has facilitated a 30% increase in production/packaging rates. In addition the company switched from tamper-evident shrink banding to tamper-evident induction seals created by Selig. The custom-produced induction seal material is a white clean-peal film with a foil backing that produces a three-dimensional holographic effect. O’Keeffe-Broadbent says “The new sealing system provides a better more efficient seal and the holographic effect enhances shelf presence.”

She adds “With the introduction of this more user-focused user-friendly package we went from selling to virtually no hardware/home center stores to selling to thousands including one of the largest home improvement chains in the nation. O’Keeffe’s products are not cosmetics. They are formulated for people who work with their hands—people who have skin splitting or cracking caused by the work they do. Now our products can be found where those people are most likely to shop.”

It’s a win-win-win packaging development. Because the packaging is highly visible shopper-attractive and adaptable to a range of space-efficient shelf display formats hardware and home store retailers like it. Because it is easy for consumers including those with tactile or arthritic problems to carry open and reclose consumers like it. And because it unlocks lucrative new marketing channels for the manufacturer O’Keeffe’s likes it. The package won a DuPont Gold Award. —Judy Rice

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