Ease of access: India's consumers are starting to question counter intuitive packaging | Economic Times

NEW DELHI: Earlier this month, D Ramakrishna, founder of a Mumbai advertising firm, vented his irritation at struggling to get a Britannia cheese block out of its wrapping."How does one get to the cheese? It's much harder than you think," he tweeted, signing off: "Yours etc, Frustrated."His plight was echoed by many, sparking dozens of comments from consumers facing similar packaging ordeals with various products, ranging from tea to ice cream."Oh! I struggled with it yesterday and I wanted to hit the guy who designed this packaging on his head with the same brick I was trying to unwrap!" wrote corporate executive Ruchica Tomar, who has more than 15,000 Twitter followers. "It was frustrating beyond words!"Indian consumers have started questioning, albeit in small numbers, consumer-unfriendly packaging. They want notches on shampoo and ketchup sachets and easy-to-peel packaging for cheese, chips, canned products, toothbrushes and batteries.Brand consultant Santosh Desai said customers struggle to open ketchup packets in fastfood restaurants due to the absence of notches, a standard practice worldwide. "Of the various variables that go into packaging considerations, users' convenience is not one of them. Cost is one of them, aesthetics is the other. You will look at various other things - how to stack, how to display," said Desai.Tinkering adds to cost"But the actual use of the packaging itself - how easy is it open and use - has so far somehow not got the attention. It is assumed that consumers are liable to accept mostly anything," Desai added.This is contrary to the current chorus of Indians demanding convenience from an array of services including ecommerce, malls, movie halls, restaurants - whenever they reopen - and other service providers. Experts said there have been limited changes in packaging for most products for decades as any tinkering adds to cost and that would be difficult to pass on to price-sensitive Indian consumers.Companies that sell snacks, cheese, candy and coffee among others have not adopted wrapping that's easy to remove as seen in many developed markets, said Vimal Kedia, managing director of Manjushree Technopack, which provides packaging solutions to companies including Reckitt Benckiser, Coca-Cola, Procter & Gamble and Nestle. This is "because there has been limited consumer demand and awareness on the matter," he said. "This packaging increases costs but the costs are not that prohibitive. Such packaging is not very difficult to implement."FieldFresh Foods, which makes Del Monte branded products in India, said it initially faced resistance from buyers when it introduced slightly larger tube packs of sandwich spread and eggless mayonnaise with notches three year ago as they were priced higher. However, acceptance has grown over the years."As you continue with the trials, people see the benefits of it. So it's really a chicken and egg situation," said Yogesh Bellani, CEO of FeildFresh. "Today my tube pack machine runs full steam and whatever is produced, it just flies off."Infra challengesThen there are supply chain glitches. The millions of kirana stores that account for almost 90% of India's $800 billion annual retail business don't always have the best handling and storage capabilities. Add to that India's poor cold chain infrastructure and the hot and humid weather. This means the emphasis is on packaging being robust rather than innovative, industry executives said.A large chocolate maker recently halted plans to launch one of its global brands because the kirana infrastructure didn't support its semi-liquid format.About 2% of Del Monte's olive oil containers suffered damage mainly due to poor handling in the last mile in the initial years. This has since been halved to 1%, it said.Companies such as Britannia and Amul said they are aware of consumer demands and are working on steps to improve packaging while balancing costs.Biscuits and dairy giant Britannia, which makes Nutrichoice and Pure Magic biscuits, pointed out that the packaging of its cheese block is gold standard technology. "The foil and carton are bonded together to retain freshness of the product and act as a firm barrier to prevent infestation by external elements," said chief commercial officer Gunjan Shah. "We are constantly listening in to consumer feedback and our packaging team is working on solutions that will further provide ease of opening not just for the cheese block but also for other innovations."Ramakrishna, the advertising veteran, wasn't too impressed."I now understand that there is a genuine issue with the current technology that they are using," he said. "But what is still not okay is the fact that they don't take the pain of either explaining it to you or finding a way around it."