Cosmetic/Personal Care Packaging.

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Personal Care Feature: Topping It Off with Style and Technology

Letting It All Show Through

Selecting a color and finish for a closure or dispenser is an important part of designing a package. Fortunately the options are endless. For the past few years, one trend has been the use of translucent bottles and caps in the specialty bath market. Gail Harrell, director of marketing for Yardley of London (Memphis), says that more recently the trend is showing up on the products of traditional mass marketers. They are bringing the "Bath & Body Works look" to the mass consumer by introducing specialty bath products and their packaging to commodity bath departments.

"What we're seeing is companies trying to bring that specialty-bath consumer over into the commodity aisle," says Harrell. "And there are a lot of players." Yardley is no exception. The company's line includes a va-riety of bath products, including bath gels, body washes, lotions, foaming bath grains, bubble bath, and moisturizing body sprays.

"These products are typically packaged in see-through bottles and colored formulas to match the fragrance, like a purple formula for a lavender fragrance and a green formula for an aloe and cucumber fragrance," Harrell says. "And those brands have been doing quite well."

Yardley recently redesigned its body wash packaging to let its colored formulas show through. As part of the redesign, the company switched from opaque to translucent caps. "When we started looking at going to a see-through bottle with colored formula," Harrell says, "it just made sense to have a see-through cap. We were trying to upscale the look, make it more contemporary, and the see-through caps seemed to achieve that. They look soothing, cool, and more colorful than the opaque caps do."

Yardley buys its caps from Zeller Plastik (Libertyville, IL). "Translucence has become a huge part of our color business," says Nancy Kane, head of marketing for Zeller Plastik. "There are many different things we can do, like formulating different intensities of that translucence or combining translucence with a metallic color."

Chip Gilroy has also seen a rising demand for translucent caps and closures. Gilroy is vice president of administration and sales for Summit Packaging (Manchester, NH), a manufacturer of flip-top tube closures. "There's definitely a demand for translucent colors," he says. "Our molding machines are running as many samples as we have in production right now, and translucent colors are one of the big requests we get—everything from a pumpkin color to a key lime color."

But because translucent caps use a degree of colorant as opposed to an exact ratio of colorant to resin, there can be a range of intensities. "We encourage our customers to approve both a high and a low color intensity, because there can be some variation in the amount of color that shows up in the translucent caps," Kane says.

Kane also says that matte-finish closures are increasingly popular. "We now have a two-inch matte-finish tube closure that lends itself nicely to some of the softer-feel tubes popular nowadays," she says.

Finishes are a great way to create a different look and aesthetic, which is critical to product differentiation, says Des McEttrick, global marketing director for Emsar Group (Stratford, CT). "We have some really interesting finishes for our dispensing pumps," she says. "We've got a soft-touch coating that makes the pump feel softer. And there's a frosted finish available, which is a nice look if you have a frosted package."

Shapes and Materials Matter

Caps and closures come in a variety of shapes to suit almost any packaging design. Different materials, each with its own benefits, are also available.

Escada Beauté, a French perfume maker, recently designed a heart-shaped package for its Sentiments fragrance. Both the clear glass bottle and the plastic closure are shaped like a heart, which is also the company's symbol. A shiny metal insert embedded in the see-through plastic cap gives the package a more elegant, upscale appearance.

"The transparence of the cap was intended to emphasize purity and modernity," says Hervé Richard, director of packaging development for Escada. The cap was molded of Eastar copolyester from Eastman Chemical Co. (Kingsport, TN). "We chose Eastar because it is the best material for achieving transparency, with its glasslike feel, maximum weight, and good compatibility with perfume," says Richard.

"Plastic offers durability and gives you design flexibility," says Clark Parker, manager for product media relations at Eastman. "You can do intricate designs and things that give you eye-catching, jump-off-the-shelf appeal and, at the same time, give you pretty significant toughness without the concerns [of breakage you have with] glass."

Parker also says that the metal cap gives only the appearance, not the reality, of better sealability than plastic. "You can get a cap made of specialty copolyesters that seals just as well as one made with metal," he explains. "But it could be that the consumer perception is that a metal cap provides a better seal, a better barrier."

Escada selected Eastar for a couple of reasons, according to Scott Rook, business market manager for personal care products and cosmetics for Eastman. "Number one was the clarity and the glossiness of the material. It's a water-clear material," Rook says. "Number two, they liked the chemical resistance of this product compared with a lot of other clear products. That's a big advantage of the copolyesters in the cosmetics market—especially in the perfume market—because fragrance tends to attack a lot of materials." Rook says that another benefit of Eastar is its dimensional stability, which makes it suitable for rigid overmolded applications like the Sentiments cap.

Getting it right was not easy, however. "The biggest difficulty is performing the injection molding without leaving bubbles and a white fog inside," says Richard. "Debugging the tools took a long time, but now it is a success and everyone likes the design."

Metal caps are also topping off successful packages in the fragrance marketplace, as Miracle by Lancôme Paris attests. The fragrance bottle's conical, anodized metal cap clicks onto the metal collar, which is assembled with a translucent plastic ring. The look is elegant and highly polished.

Lancôme chose Germany-based supplier Seidel to manufacture the metal cap and collar. "The [Miracle] project is a good example of the increasing demand for system delivery and one-stop shopping," says Boris Schaefer, manager of customer relations for the U.S. market. Seidel produced the entire cap assembly, controlling and documenting all critical dimensions.

"Metal is a [delicate] material" that requires expert handling, adds Schaefer. "We push the limits of metal transformation to achieve today's innovative designs, which are getting more and more complex."

Advanced Technology Sells

Pumps and dispensers are becoming increasingly high-tech, and incorporating these components into a product's packaging can add a lot of value. Pumps and dispensers that leak or that will not dispense product at the right speed can frustrate consumers. And, of course, good-looking packaging components al-ways add to the overall shelf appeal of a product.

Exxel Container (Somerset, NJ), for instance, manufactures the Atmos dispensing system, which does not require any propellants or pumping to dispense the product. As the package is filled, a pleated PET inner bottle expands. The inner bottle is inserted into a rubber sleeve prior to filling, and that rubber sleeve also expands as the bottle is filled. The expanded rubber sleeve's natural tendency to return to its normal size provides the propelling power.

"It's very similar to an aerosol in that you just press the actuator button for continuous product dispensing," says Robert Flaherty, director of marketing for Exxel Container. "But it doesn't require propellants to dispense the product."

Clarins recently chose the Atmos dispenser for use on its Spray Auto-Bronzant Express/Self Tanning Instant Spray. According to Flaherty, the dispenser is well suited for use with products such as sunless tanners because it applies a very soft, continuous, controlled spray. "The product can be applied to the skin with little overspray," says Flaherty. "In addition, our package can dispense product at any angle. It will continue to dispense regardless of the [direction] of the spray, even upside down."

Because it's a high-tech package, the Atmos dispensing system, like other barrier systems, costs more than traditional pumps and aerosol dispensers currently available. But for certain applications, the extra cost can be justified. "It's great for applications where the hermetically sealed benefit of our package is important," says Flaherty. "For example, [a company] may not want to introduce air and the bacteria associated with air [into a product, as can occur] with a pump. Or perhaps they do not want to introduce propellants, like [those used] in a typical aerosol; they want pure product delivery, and our system provides that benefit."

Emsar Group also offers an innovative dispensing option. The company's Anti-Clog Re-Locking Fine Mist Sprayer does not clog with high-resin products, even over time. "This addresses one of the biggest consumer complaints about pumps," says Des McEttrick, global marketing director. "And the sprayer has a door that relocks easily, enabling consumers to carry their products without risk of leakage."

This type of sprayer is especially useful in product categories like hair care, sun care, and, to a lesser extent, body care. "It also has a wider finger pad, which is perceived as easier to actuate," McEttrick adds. "And like other Emsar fine-mist sprayers, the upside-down spray option is available." The company also provides a showerproof dispensing pump that prevents water ingression into the bottle.

One company well known for its innovative designs and dispensing technologies is Italian pump manufacturer Taplast. The company, with its U.S. headquarters in Doylestown, PA, has developed an all-plastic lotion pump and an all-plastic spray pump. Both are lightweight and completely recyclable. And the pump's external spring, along with the cap and pump head, can be custom colored, enabling a total coordinated look across a range of packages. According to the company, their pumps' design carries high product recognizability on the shelf—98% in consumer recall tests.

"The pumps are very versatile in terms of how they can look," says Guy Considine, vice president of product development and marketing services for Chicago-based Berlin Packaging, Taplast's U.S. distributor. They can be produced in various colors and combined with graphics and bottles in different shapes, for looks ranging from funky to sophisticated.

Alberto Culver uses an all-plastic pump from Taplast on both its TRESemmé European Vitamin E Smooth & Shape Styling Créme and its nonaerosol Alberto European Salon Finishing Hairspray. "We chose the pump because it functions well compatibility-wise," says Caroline Stankovich, outsourcing manager for Alberto Culver USA (Melrose Park, IL). "We also liked the aesthetics, particularly the bellows—they're very innovative."

Taplast also manufactures a dial-a-dose system that allows the consumer to select a dose by turning an external ring. The company says that major players in the professional hair-care field have already ex-pressed interest in the system.

Beyond Ordinary

Because caps, pumps, and dispensers are an important part of the package—both aesthetically and functionally—personal-care and cosmetic companies must select these items carefully. And because there are so many options, the selection process can be daunting. But incorporating a well-designed and attractive closure or dispenser into the package can mean the difference between an ordinary package and an extraordinary one.

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