Unilever to bring in ‘open approach’ to pack design

Miles Eddowes, Unilever’s head of R&D for home and personal care and its director for open innovation, said the company had to realise that it could not be the master of all the packaging technologies needed for its products.

By failing to collaborate outside of the company, he claimed Unilever had missed out on the opportunity to tap into a mass of great minds.

Its collaborative approach encourages individuals to bring ideas to the company, which can then be married with Unilever’s capabilities and brands.

Richard Parker, Unilever’s group manager of packaging design and technology centre, said that packaging had an important role to play in saving costs.

He illustrated his point with an example of a bottle-neck redesign that not only reduced material use by 35%, but also cut production time in half, while strengthening the cap by 65%.

“The result of this is that we can use less material for the same packaging experience,” he explained.

Steve Kelsey, partner at PI Group, used his presentation to argue that collaboration with consumers was another central part of product innovation.

In addition to Dell and Swatch watches, Kelsey highlighted the example of Nike, a company that allows its customers to design their own trainers on its website.

“People use it on a regular basis,” he said. “That’s how far consumers are prepared to go in order to become part of the design process.”

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