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“Hey … it's just a box!”

That's the way many pizza industry executives view that thing which carries their company's point of pride. They cite focus group research that they've conducted which appears to support the notion that pizza-buyers don't care about the box. So they continue on with the same carton they've had for the last 10, 20, or 30 years — and which 5000 of their competitors continue on with, as well. Or, worse yet, they decide that the wisest move is to cheapen their box with flimsier material, thereby saving a half-cent per unit.

But is that a correct conclusion? Is that the most profitable perspective?

In fact, there's a mountain of research and authoritative literature that suggests otherwise — research that proves:

Here's what they have to say.

The Definitive Source. In his groundbreaking book, The Total Package, Thomas Hine states: “The ability of packaging to bypass the intellect and induce a consuming forgetfulness is what makes it so effective. Although packaging pervades daily life and is found in every nook and cranny of the home and workplace, it flies beneath nearly everyone's analytic radar. It only comes to the fore when there's a problem. People think about packaging when they have trouble getting it open, or when it's empty and it contributes to litter or overflowing landfills.”

Hine then quotes from a noted packaging text: “‘Two concepts form the basis of package design research,’ wrote Walter P. Stern in a textbook on the subject published in 1981. ‘One, consumers really do not distinguish between a product and its package — many products are packages (and many packages are products). Two, consumers relate emotionally not to the fact (the realities) of the products/packages they are involved with, but rather to their perceived realities.’”

Eye-opening Research. Referencing the work of Louis Cheskin, a marketing psychologist and groundbreaking researcher of packaging who began his work in the 1930s, Hine continues: “In other words, all package design research, no matter what methods are used, is about Cheskin's principle of sensation transference. It has little interest in what people think about the package. What's important is what the package makes people feel about the product.

“Cheskin's original experiment has been repeated year after year, with countless products in a great many variations ever since he first did it. And despite increasing consumer sophistication about marketing tactics, despite defensiveness and cynicism, it still works.

“One of the most dramatic versions of the Cheskin experiment involved an identical underarm deodorant that was mailed out to a test group in three different packages in which the color combinations were varied. The subjects were told that the deodorants were three different formulations under consideration and were asked to state their preferences and their judgment of each of the three formulations. In such three-way tests, consumers sometimes react like Goldilocks did to the Three Bears' lifestyle. In this case, color-scheme B was the one considered ‘just right.’ Those tested praised its pleasant yet unobtrusive fragrance and its ability to stop wetness and odor for as many as twelve hours. Color-scheme C was found to have a strong aroma, but not really very much effectiveness. And color-scheme A was downright threatening. Several users developed skin rashes after using it, and three had severe enough problems to consult dermatologists.

“Recently, Cheskin + Masten [now Cheskin Added Value], the successor firm to the one Cheskin founded, repeated a variation of the original experiment for the makers of Christian Brothers brandy. Four different groups of brandy drinkers were used. The first group compared brandies in a blind taste test, in which neither Christian Brothers nor E&J, a comparably priced, California-made competitor, was identified. Christian Brothers won, with the respondents saying that it had a ‘more upscale’ taste. The second group was given the brandy identified by brandy names, but without the bottle. The preference for Christian Brothers was more overwhelming, with Christian Brothers praised for its ‘smooth taste.’ The third group was served the brandy from their bottles. The Christian Brothers bottle was plain and rather generic. The E&J bottle, while not the sort that typically wins design awards, had an ornate, old-world look. This group picked the E&J brandy as the higher-quality product. The fourth group was served E&J from the Christian Brothers bottle and Christian Brothers from the E&J bottle. As with the third group, they had a strong preference for the brandy in the more elaborate (E&J) bottle, in this case the Christian Brothers brandy. The clear conclusion was that Christian Brothers would benefit from a new bottle. The company later improved its sales by introducing a fancier new bottle, almost as ugly as E&J's. The main thing that this shows is that package design is important.”

But what about pizza packaging? Three-quarters of a century of scientific research tells us that packaging — both structure and graphics — influences consumer's perception of the product contained therein. So is it likely that — while being influenced by virtually every other form of product packaging — consumers are somehow immune to being influenced by pizza packaging?

No way!

Interestingly, at least some research has apparently suggested a connection between the pizza carton and perceived product quality. Buried in the February 28, 2000, issue of Nation's Restaurant News is this revealing quote: “...said Tim McIntyre, vice president of corporation communications for Domino's Pizza, ‘Our research indicates that in blind taste tests we do as well or better than our competitors. But when you put the same pizza in a Domino's box, the perception of our quality goes down.’”

Still, many pizza industry executives assume that consumers are not influenced by a pizza carton. Why would that be? Probably for two reasons, both succinctly stated in The Total Package. First: “People are affected by packaging in ways that they do not consciously understand,” Hine sums up. As Cheskin discovered, it matters not what people think about a package but, rather, how the package makes people feel about the product (and, we add, how it also makes them feel about the company, or brand, that's the creator of the product).

Second: “The most common failure of package designs is not so much that they fail to communicate, but that they communicate the wrong thing,” concludes Hine. (For an eye-opening example, click here.)

No, the humble pizza box is not “just a box.” In fact — to the contrary — it's a Carton of Manifold and Great Opportunity … opportunity that, by and large, has been going unrecognized and untapped within the pizza industry.

To find out exactly HOW a pizza box can be used to build sales, profit, and competitive advantage, see Creating a Sales-building A-bomb.

If you'd like to explore how Cheskin's principle of sensation transference could be applied to your pizza carton for dramatic impact, contact John Correll - 734-455-5830 or email john@correllconcepts.com. We likely can help you achieve this at no additional packaging cost to your company ... in other words, free of charge. Please note — Correll Concepts is a packaging design specialist, not a box manufacturer.