How Candy Makers Can Boost Revenue With Intentional Packaging Strategies
When shopping for candy, most consumers don’t notice the candy first. They notice the packaging it comes in.
Candy packaging does more than serve as a container. It protects and displays the candy you’ve worked hard to perfect. It represents your brand and competes for attention. It aligns with consumer values and desires. For candy manufacturers, the packaging is almost as important as the candy itself.
Let’s take a look at some of the current candy packaging trends, and how your brand can leverage these to boost brand awareness and revenue.
To Wrap or Not To Wrap?
Various candy coatings and textures play a role in the kind of packaging that is most appropriate. Some packaging, like plastic or foil bags, help keep gummies fresh whether they are coated in wax, sugar, or citric acid. Stand-up bags or bags with bottom gussets make filling easy, and promote the candy’s fun, sharable nature.
Sticky candies, like taffy, or hard candies, like lollipops, are often better suited for individual wrappers. Twist wrappers can be plastic, foil, or wax-coated paper, and have the added benefit of another branding opportunity. Logos placed on wrappers reinforce the candy’s brand while protecting the texture and freshness of each individual candy.
Preserve Unique Candy Shapes
Chocolate truffles, macarons, or other candies with delicate shapes may not maintain optimal conditions if packaged in a bag, whether they are wrapped or not. Candy with intricate designs, or carefully tempered chocolates could break or become damaged easily.
To maintain the shape’s integrity, these candies fare best in boxes with separated compartments. Often, each candy is individually cradled in paperboard inserts or glassine candy cups to add another protective layer that also elevates the luxurious presentation of high-end candies.
Packaging’s Visual Appeal
Candy packaging’s job is to catch the eye of the consumer. It’s important for packaging to stand out on the shelf! Leveraging color psychology can align with the brand’s vibe, and highlighting a logo and custom imagery can further convey that energy.
If the candy itself is visually appealing, packaging that includes a transparent window can offer a sneak peek, showing off the actual product inside.
Clear messaging, concise ingredients lists, and playful copy can further enhance the packaging to create an optimal user experience.
Sustainability is More Than a Trend
“Paperisation” has been coined as the term used to describe the industry’s growing trend of shifting from plastic packaging to paper. Paper packaging is generally “trusted by consumers and perceived as natural.” However, paper is not a practical solution for every candy’s packaging.
Beyond paper, sustainable packaging continues to grow in alignment with consumer preferences for more natural and environmentally-friendly products. Leveraging lightweight or recyclable packaging can elevate a brand’s market position and overall appeal as sustainability remains a prominent consumer decision-making factor.
Single Serve is the New King Size
Particularly in America, the spike of GLP-1 and other weight-loss medications play a role in the entire food industry, including candies and sweet treats. Users of these medications represent about 12% of the total U.S. population, and a reduction in portion size is a regular shift in patients’ eating behavior.
Shifting to single-serving packaging for portion control can help candy brands align with better-for-you markets. Rather than a bigger-is-better mentality, consumers are more likely to lean into smaller, bite-sized indulgences to celebrate little pleasures while maintaining their larger health and weight loss goals.
Further, consumers are battling inflation with the rise of little treat culture. Small, more frequent indulgences help people get past a stressful work day or extend their budget further than an expensive night on the town, so a larger package with single servings can appeal to both health- and budget-conscious consumers.
Make It Collectible
By nature, humans love to collect things. The allure of the structure of collecting spans across generations, and makes people feel more secure and more in control. By offering collectible tins, jars, or boxes, brands have the opportunity to tune into that intrinsic human desire, while boosting brand loyalty.
Creating various collections can become an extension of a full brand story. Blogs, emails, and social media posts could offer depth to packaging images, or provide sneak peeks into what may be coming next.
Align Candy Production and Packaging Strategies With Truffly Made
If you haven’t considered how your packaging strategy impacts your candy sales, it’s a good idea to revisit and restructure that strategy before the busy holiday season begins.
Updating recipes, expanding flavor varieties, or creating new infusions all deserve an updated marketing strategy. Optimizing your packaging to best protect those new products while aligning with consumer trends will play a significant role in new product success.
Reach out to the Truffly Made team to learn more about new product development, or to outfit your kitchen for the most efficient production line possible. Email us at info@trufflymade.com, or contact us here.