Murphy's Law...

Packaging design may be the single most annoying factor in running your own goods based business.  It's tedious and deceivingly difficult.  Just when you think you have it all worked out, a monkey wrench comes flying in out of nowhere....usually after you've spent money on labels, boxes, tags, bells and whistles - rendering your business bank account smoking, with no progress or final end result.  Inevitably, something doesn't work out.  The labels are too big, the boxes are too small, it's not cost effective...on and on.  It's really enough to drive me to alcoholism.  MINIMUM, a righteous bender.

I've had the same packaging for years.  I didn't even like it to begin with, but went with it because it did what it needed to do at the time, and I just got lazy and simultaneously too busy to deal with it.  I'm not a Kraft/country aesthetic kinda person, yet that's what I had going on. Makes perfect sense. 

This past week I have suspended making product and focused my energy on creating a sleeker, more upscale look to my product line.  How freaking hard can that be?  I'm computer savvy.  I can work a label program decently, most times.  I designed a new logo & new labels with a new black and silver color scheme.  Not just for my soap, but all my B&B goods and even tucked away ideas for a future candle line, as well.  That means ordering new labels.  Many shapes and sizes. Many made of differen't material depending on application.  I ordered new boxes.  I figured out it was just as effective to order business cards online as it was for me to burn through ink to print them myself, so I bought those too.  Of course, new labels created more issues.  Now I needed to change containers on a couple of things too, in keeping with my new look.  There's another whole new ball of wax....
Then there's embellishments.  Ribbons, baubles, assorted accessorizing ideas...all of which end up scaled back because my soap would need to be sold for about $45 a bar to offset the cost.   *creativity squelched*.

Now the boxes don't work.  They look good and all, but are just large enough to make what I can fit in a flat rate envelope, far less than what my customers are used to getting for that price.  CURSES!  Also Microsoft Word is for chumps.  I hate that program.  Ever try to center an image in a template?  Maddening.  Screw you, Bill Gates.

You smell what I'm cookin' now, don'tcha?  *sigh*  It all seemed so simple in my head.

At any rate, I have moved on to Plan J now, purchased even more stuff to rework things, and still have no end product.  Nor have I made anything new for the actual shop, while fielding countless emails and Facebook posts about where the hell their favorite soap is. 

This time would have been much more well spent swirling a paper umbrella in a fruity chick drink in the tropical sun somewhere. 

 

Look for new packaging.....in the 2067 line!