Packaging design decisions made after the designer starts cost more and take longer to fix than ones made before. Here's what you need to have thought through before you send a brief.

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Primary vs. secondary packaging

Primary packaging is what touches the product: the bottle, tube, pot, or sachet. Secondary packaging is what you see on shelf or in the shipping box: the carton, outer box, or sleeve. These need separate briefs and often involve different suppliers. Know which you need designed before you engage a designer.

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Your materials and formats

Do you have your manufacturer locked in? If not, the packaging design may need to adapt to what your manufacturer can actually produce. Certain finishes (foiling, embossing, soft-touch lamination) are only available on certain substrates from certain suppliers. The design brief should reflect what's achievable with your production setup, not a theoretical ideal.

If you're still in manufacturer conversations, share what you know with the designer. A good packaging designer can flag constraints early rather than delivering work that can't be produced.

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Regulatory requirements

Beauty packaging is regulated differently depending on the market. EU, UK, and US all have specific requirements for ingredient listings, claims language, batch codes, and mandatory symbols. If you're launching into retail, your buyer may have additional requirements.

Know which markets you're launching in before the brief. These requirements affect how much text goes on the pack, which in turn affects the design layout.

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Number of SKUs and line architecture

Are you designing one product or a line? A line needs a visual architecture: a system that makes each product recognizable as part of the family while also being clearly differentiated by variant. This takes more time and costs more than designing a single SKU, and it should be scoped accordingly.

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How the pack will be used

Where is this product sold? On shelf in a physical retailer, it needs to work at a distance. As a direct-to-consumer purchase viewed on a phone screen, the detail matters more. As a luxury gift, the unboxing experience might be part of the brief. Each context changes what the design needs to do.

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What Owlsome includes in packaging design

Our packaging projects include brand-consistent design across all sides and surfaces, print-ready files to spec, and mockups for review and approval. We work within your manufacturing constraints and brief requirements.

Packaging from €1,500 for the first SKU, €500 for each additional. Always built on an existing brand identity.

Get in touch to talk through your packaging project, or see our portfolio.