Label Redesign Project

Graphic Design | Design Research

OVERVIEW

I was asked to create new packaging for a premium traffic signage product. Through the course of the research I discovered that the design that would have the highest customer impact and would be cheapest for us to implement was a label redesign instead. This project is a great example of how research can help to unlock the right path forward and how good design isn't always to flashiest design. This user centered, customer focused project is one of my favorites to discuss because of it's subtle complexity.

ROLE & DURATION

Project Design Lead | 3M

Design Research, Graphic Design, Creative Direction, User Research, Testing, Print Management

Mar - July 2018

The Ask

I was approached by our transportation leadership to redesign our sign sheeting packaging. Specifically, they felt that a nicer looking box would increase sales with our customers at a minimal cost increase. As with all my design projects I started in the research phase to understand how our customers are currently using our box, any problems they are having with it, and how the box itself is manufactured.

Customer Visits

I visited many customer sites to get a better understanding of the boxes journey from manufacturing plant to customer. I noticed, that once the customer receives the product they store it on a shelf where all they can see is the label, and once the roll comes out of the box, the box is either thrown away and the roll is hung up, or the box is stored once again on the shelves it came from. The box didn't seem to be that important to our customers, but the label seemed very important.

Pattern Identification

During the research a pattern started to appear. At every shop I went to our labels were being modified by the customer. Writing important information much larger, adding color to the label so that they can more easily identify it at a distance, mixed with all the other boxes. There wasn't a single shop that I visited that didn't have this kind of modification added to it. This brought me to the realization that the box was not actually a priority, but the label needed quite a bit of changes.

This vendor writes the roll width in sharpie so that it is easier to see.

This vendor writes the sheeting type, and color on the box as well as adding a sticker to denote color.

This vendor cuts a sample of sheeting off the roll and writes the roll width on it.

This vendor writes the roll diameter on the box to better understand the amount of sheeting they have.

Label Review

Looking at the current label, there were a lot of problems. There was no consistency on the label between products. The important information was typed in very small font. The logo was extremely pixelated, and in general it was unappealing and difficult to read especially at long distances. Extremely hard to tell each label apart and hard to know what is in each box at a quick glance.

Initial Ideation

The first step was to understand what information was needed on the label itself and to begin to brainstorm how that information could be displayed more efficiently and still adhere to our label design guidelines.

Final Design

After working with our corporate guidelines and with our customers I was able to create a final design that our customers loved and accounted for all potential label variables on nearly 1000 sku's.

Here you can see the final design (left), contrasted with the original (right).

Unforeseen Challenges

One thing that I did not foresee was the disorganization in the back end system that supplied information to the labels. Consistency was going to be king when designing this new efficient label. I ended up going through our entire SKU library and re-writing everything so that it would appear properly when the label printed. I also created documentation on how to enter SKU information into the system properly in the future, so that the consistency issue would not come up again.

Results

In the end, the new label was an overwhelming success. Our sales team reported that every customer called in to applaud the improvements. In addition, it did not change packaging costs in any way. So we saw extremely high customer satisfaction for no additional expense on our part. This is one of my all time favorite projects that I have worked on because it so clearly demonstrates how good research and good design can be such a benefit to everyone.