There has been a continuous shift from retail shopping to e-commerce purchases in the last five years. However, it has been a slow process. The recent months of the pandemic have accelerated this shift. The projections rose to 40% to 50% of online purchases compared to the shopping trends in the pre-pandemic world.
In such a scenario, the concept of omnichannel retailing is gaining popularity. Retailers now have to ensure a seamless shopping experience for their consumers, regardless of the initial location of the product in the shipping process. The main aim is to develop packaging solutions that ensure speed, quality, reduced overall costs, and improved consumer experience.
The product packaging in this entire scenario is easier said than done. Companies may have to initiate the shipping of their products from various locations, including manufacturing units, distribution centers, fulfillment houses, and retail stores. It means that a desirable consumer experience in a retail environment may not remain desirable when the product is brought into the e-commerce situation.
Nonetheless, an omnichannel approach tends to change the entire scenario significantly. When a consumer places an order for any product, it may come from any of the locations that have this product in stock. That location could be a retail store, a distribution center, or the manufacturing facility itself.
In such a scenario, the product may have to be placed in a corrugated box before it is shipped to a particular address. It means that the product may have to be exposed to a bumpy journey via a car, a postal vehicle, or a truck.
Considerations for omnichannel retailing
This article tends to provide only the basic information about how omnichannel retailing works. For this purpose, we will list a few considerations.
- Retailers need to use durable materials for the primary packaging of their products.
- See if you can produce two designs for the same product – one for the retail stores and one for e-commerce.
- Referring to Amazon may be the best way to develop more efficient packaging designs.
- What is the sustainability value of your package when it disposed of or sent to the recycling units?
- You will need to see the impact of resin supply pricing and availability on the packaging design decisions. For instance, recycled PET supply and quality face disruption due to COVID-19. On the other hand, prices for virgin PET and high-density polyethylene (HDPE) resins are the lowest ever.
Aside from these considerations, the success and failure also depend on how brand owners establish internal communication. Departments of most businesses, nowadays, are not coordinating with each other quite well. It means that a department makes a decision without taking into consideration the ability of another department to execute that decision. For instance, if a marketing strategy focuses on creating an aesthetically perfect packaging design but doesn’t consider the packaging efficiency, the end result will more likely be a disaster.
A packaging that can facilitate omnichannel marketing should have marketing, design, operations, production, and procurement well aligned.
