The top 2016 packaging trends for food and beverages include light weighting and sustainability while being simplified and convey a food truck’s brand and being convenient for consumer use.
Consumers of every age bracket are documenting their opinions and the details of their food truck orders with selfies, tweets and posts. This puts a little more pressure on today’s vendors to connect with modern consumers, and still fit functionality and sustainability with style into their offerings.
Because of this food truck owners need to understand that they are selling much more than their menu items. Packaging plays a key role in conveying your food truck brand and solidifies your connections with consumers.
2016 Packaging Trends For Food and Beverages:
Light Weighting Packaging
Light weighting has become a major trend in the packaging industry. The basic premise is to reduce the amount of raw materials and the carbon footprint of a package. The phasing out heavier materials and substituting it with lighter alternatives will be the result of this trend.
Sustainable Packaging
To go along with the first of the 2016 packaging trends, the reason for light weighting is because consumers are more concerned than ever about the environment. However, these consumers are passively green and they want food businesses that provide the meals they purchase to do the heavy lifting.
In the past few years, Styrofoam packaging has come under attack by environmentalists. As a result, some vendors have started using eco-friendly packaging for their food truck food. We have seen a gradual shift and growth of bio-based/plant-based plastic on the marketplace. Sustainable packaging is effective at alleviating consumer guilt, and this type of packaging has allowed some vendors to use it as a competitive tool to drive sales.
Provide Packaging With Personality
As more people eat and drink on the go, consumers want packaging that is easy to hold, open, use and reseal. For beverages, packaging must produce an even stream of fluid to allow consumers drink while walking, and closures that seal tightly to prevent spills.
A secondary but increasingly important consideration for on-the-go packaging is style. More people are eating and sipping while walking and going to work. Visual appeal is becoming increasingly important. Why? Consumers want products that offer style as well as functionality.
Keep The Message Simple But Strong
The purpose of your packaging needs to provide a simplified message that must be stated clearly and boldly across the face of the packaging. Simplicity does not come off as lazy or incomplete but refreshing and honest. Modern food and beverage packaging must identify what the customer wants but comes off as powerful and trustworthy.
Consumer Convenience
Convenience is a major selling point for food and beverage packaging. An upward trending percentage of the US population lives in cities, and food truck for urban-dwellers should take into account that many of them walk and use public transportation. That means that food and beverage packaging must offer a range of sizes while still being sturdy, compact and lightweight.
Features such as ease of opening, re-sealability, portability, lighter weight, and no-mess dispensing are packaging benefits that influence consumers’ purchasing decisions positively.
These 2016 food and beverage packaging trends will lead smart vendors to invest in solutions that not only maximize the value of their brands while simultaneously reducing their carbon footprint.
How will these 2016 packaging trends influence your food truck? Share your thoughts in the comment section below or on social media. Facebook | Twitter
