Call for entries: Better With Less packaging design competition

Better with Less – Design Challenge, the international packaging design competition organized by fiber paperboard manufacturer Metsä Board, aims to find new and more sustainable packaging solutions for some of the world’s most frequently used and fastest growing types of consumer packages. The competition is free to enter, and the deadline for submissions is March 31, 2018. The first prize-winner will receive $12,000 while a student winner will receive a two-month internship at Metsä Board in Shanghai.

Says Metsä, packages will continue to have an important role in protecting and promoting products in the future, but as consumption grows, it’s becoming ever more important to develop packaging solutions that enable the use of renewable, non-fossil-based materials and a wiser use of resources. Metsä Board recognizes that packaging designers play a decisive role in this, and that environmental impacts can be reduced, for example, by making packaging lighter, using renewable materials, and making recycling easier.

“We need to come up with new solutions and consider future generations—and think of ways we can create better consumer experiences that create less impact on the environment. With this competition, we aim to help advance innovative and sustainable packaging design in the world,” says competition jury chairman Cyril Drouet, Design & Innovation Director, Metsä Board.

The competition will be judged on aesthetics, product protection, sustainability, ergonomics/functionality, user experience/human interaction, mass production/commercial feasibility, and degree of innovation. The international jury includes Terri Goldstein, branding and packaging design professional, Peter Désilets, strategist and specialist in packaging sustainability aspects, Marianne Rosner Klimchuk, packaging design expert and Chair at Communication Design Pathways Department of Fashion Institute of Technology, Lars G. Wallentin, packaging designer, and John B. Mahaffie, futurist with primary expertise in future packaging solutions.

See the rules and submissions. The finalists and the winners will be announced in spring 2018. Follow the competition on social media at #betterwithless.