20+ of the Coolest Packaging Designs

“Product Package” is a job with a lot of responsibilities. Packaging must effectively contain and protect its contents, inform the consumer as to what it contains and act as a salesperson for the product.

Creating an attractive, eye-catching, functional package design falls to graphic designers. Good package and label designers have to account for several factors, including but not limited to:

• Required marks such as barcodes, warnings, or expiration dates
• Written copy
• Style choices
• Brand identity
• Shelf impact
• Budget for mass production
• Functionality
• Packaging layers
• Clarity
• Honest product representation

We’ve compiled over 20 of our favorite package designs from classic to trendy that manage to cover all these bases in beautiful and creative ways.

1. Blueprint Juice

Simple and to the point, these juice bottles let the typography and ingredients speak for themselves, literally. They make great use of color without compromising the minimalist feel by showcasing the rich color of their products. Blueprint’s logo is as simple as the rest of the packaging and is recolored for each flavor to complement the color of the juice inside.

2. Puma’s Clever Little Bag

Puma created a shoebox and bag combo to get rid of useless tissue paper, extra plastic and minimize the amount of materials that go into their packaging altogether. The result is this attractive little bag/box. The inner box gives it structure and protects the shoe while the fabric covering doubles as the outside of the box. It features a handle to make it carryable and showcase both Puma’s branding as well as explaining the story behind this clever package design.

3. Pressed by KIND

KIND is known for their simple ingredients and natural but bold flavors. Their bright, bold gradients are blended in a way that make the packages seem to glow, catching the eye from several hundred feet away. The color palettes of each flavor reflect the bright colors of the fruity products contained inside.

4. Watkins

JR Watkins proudly displays its heritage in more ways than one. “Crafted in the USA since 1868… Naturally” is their tagline and their packaging reflects that. From cleaning products to spices to beauty products, Watkins packaging has an old-timey feel. The fonts, color choices and package shapes are all a callback to the late 1800s. This allows their whole line to highlight their heritage as well as their natural, authentic philosophy.

5. Urban Decay: Game of Thrones

Urban Decay has a long history of releasing limited edition palettes or lines along with popular movies or TV shows. They’ve outdone themselves with their Game of Thrones collection. The eyeshadow palette features a pop-up iron throne as well as makeup brushes with hilts that mimic famous swords from the show. Every aspect of the packaging features some special detail to encourage fans to splurge.

6. Adidas

Entirely devoid of both extraneous packaging and with nary a drop of ink, this package features a cutout in the shape of the Adidas logo where the consumer can see the actual shoe. We love how this innovative package design is minimal in both style and substance. It’s about as simple as you could get without being boring.

7. Carlsberg

Aluminum cans have long been recyclable, but we’ve all seen the devastating images of sea creatures caught in the plastic rings that hold six packs together. Carlsberg has finally come up with a solution to change that. The “Snap Packs” use an adhesive to hold the cans together and 76 percent less plastic than traditional six pack rings. Not only have they solved a decades old problem for the six pack, they’ve done so with a clever design that connects the cans to showcase their logo in a clever, attractive way.

8. Blend Juices

These naturally derived juices use beautifully blended, bright gradients to complement the juices inside each bottle. Gradients are often just used as a background feature, but in this case, the gradient is the main design component. The copy is minimal and the font clean and simple, letting the colors of the label and the juice shine.

9. Benefit Cosmetics

Benefit cosmetics has fun with their vintage inspired packaging. Using colorful pop-art imagery, clever titles and bold retro fonts, they create playful, eye-catching packaging that gives each of their products its own personality.

10. Dole: Captain Marvel

Dole’s “Powering the Hero Within” campaign is designed to “applaud women everywhere who use their powers...to fight for a healthier and more equitable planet.” Captain Marvel characters will be on tens of millions of stickers on Dole bananas and hang tags on pineapples in U.S. and Canada. They’re simple in design but do a great job spreading awareness of their campaign which includes recipes, real-life hero profiles and the #DoleHero hashtag.

11. Apple

Apple is famous for elegance and innovation in just about every aspect of their design and marketing from their phones to the brilliant, iPad commercial comparing the ubiquity of its uses to that of a pencil. Their packaging is no exception. Apple’s clean, simple boxes are made from thick, quality cardboard and feature minimal decoration. They look and feel expensive, giving the customer the sense that the product contained therein is worth the hefty price tag.

12. GE and Hanes

GE and Hanes have both created stripped down (pun intended) versions of their packaging. The simple, cardboard designs eliminate single-use plastics altogether and use only recyclable materials. The GE packaging lets the product shine through by displaying the bulbs rather than hiding them.

13. Tatcha Brightening Serum

These beautiful bottles makes use of a sunrise gradient to set off the serum inside. Bold bottles feature purple, fuchsia, and pink that catch the eye and convey a sense of brightness and natural beauty. The sunrise look does a great job of communicating that the product is designed to brighten the skin.

14. Target’s Market Pantry Line

Market Pantry is one of ten private label brands available at target. They redesigned the packaging with great success a few years ago by giving the packages a consistent, on brand, red background and mixing in bold fonts with a retro feel. The vintage look and feel of this packaging is eye catching and conveys a homey authenticity.

15. Tic-Tac Minions

Tic-Tacs took advantage of already having a tiny, multitudinous, Minion shaped product with their Minion line, released along with the wildly popular Minions movie. The limited-edition candies featured collectible, Minion shaped packaging, and yellow tic-tacs emblazoned with those adorable Minion faces. This type of limited edition with bright colors and easily recognizable characters maximizes shelf appeal and encourages impulse buys.

16. Glossier

Glossier’s packaging uses color and typography to convey everything you need to know about these high-end beauty products. Using mostly white packaging conveys a sense of purity and cleanliness. When color is used, it complements the white labels, making the white pop even more.

17. Procter & Gamble

Procter and Gamble recently released reusable, refillable packaging for several of its most popular products including Pantene, Cascade, Tide, Crest, Ariel, and Febreze. These reusable packages are as attractive as they are functional, a smart move in encouraging consumers to ditch the single use plastics. They managed to create durable and aesthetically pleasing packaging made from sustainable materials that will complement just about any décor--a great way to promote their brand and encourage sustainable habits.

18. Twist Tea

These creative boxes make use of gorgeous monochrome gradients that fade up into a crisp, clean white. The bright colors correspond to the flavor of tea inside and give the twisted boxes a lovely, glowing appearance that conveys energy and a sort of Zen feel all at once.

19. Aviation Gin

Ryan Reynold’s new line of Gin uses art deco-inspired design to give the bottles a gorgeous, high-end look. The bottles themselves feature an embossed logo and clean, retro lines while the label uses classic 1940’s fonts to give it a classic vintage feel.

20. Game of Thrones Scotch

Eight different distilleries offered limited edition bottles of scotch in concert with one another. Each distillery is correlated with one of the great houses of Westeros from the show/book series, with the eighth representing the Night’s Watch. Each bottle and collectible tube features a stylized version of the house sigil and some information about both the house and the scotch itself. The intricate, artistic designs are stunning, and fans are responding, with some bottles going for well over $100.

21. Outside the Box

Getting really creative with your packaging is a great way to grab your customers’ attention in the store or online. If you do it right, you might even get some free, viral publicity. Packaging that cleverly makes use of transparent windows is an easy, fun way to spice up your packaging and showcase your product at the same time.

Some brands have added tactile or interactive features to their packaging such as Smirnoff’s Caipiroska peelable bottle from 2011 or Nike Air’s package that takes itself quite literally.

Another way to get creative with your packaging is by utilizing unusual shapes such as 3M’s ear plugs box with a “volume control” lid or Barking Dogs’ clever design that showcases the socks as the lolling tongues of adorable dogs. Petit-Pli, a clothing company for kids took their packaging a step further, by making it re-purposable as a pretend jet pack.

How to Create Great Packages & Labels

All of these packages have one thing in common: They were all created by talented, experienced designers. Good package design isn’t easy; there are a lot of factors to consider and it involves no small amount of risk.

Bad package design will result in poor sales and/or frustrated, disappointed customers. Great package design will increase your sales and visibility in amazing ways.

The trick is finding experienced designers without breaking the bank or taking up months of your time. That’s where Superside comes in. Our global team of designers, copywriters, and project managers can take your packaging to the next level at affordable prices and in half the time of traditional agencies.

Reach out today so we can help you unbox your company’s full potential. See more about our packaging design services!