Luxury Packaging: Achieving a High-End Look
Clear components complete the transparent look of the Body by Victoria EDT bottle. There's more than one way to convey luxury.
By Jenevieve Blair PolinNew processes, materials, and engineering techniques offer a selection of ways, at greatly varying costs, to achieve virtually the same effects in luxury packaging. To make sense of the options, designers should share with component manufacturers the finished looks they desire, but remain flexible as to how the effects might be accomplished.
Being Clear
Clear packaging is a strong trend for both cosmetics and fragrances. "It's a very clean look," says Jerry Sapienza, president of Geka Toly USA, the company's new name as of January 2003. "Designers tell us it's modern, the look that Calvin Klein has pioneered—with sharp, defined geometric shapes and clear materials."
Cary Clubb, marketing communications manager for Eastman Chemical Co. (Kingsport, TN), agrees. Eastman makes Eastar copolyester, which Clubb says is being selected for its "water-clear aesthetics."
When faced with the challenge of creating a transparent housing to contain an inner compact, one option is to mold the inserts and then overmold. With overmolding, the injection-molded inner parts are placed in a second mold, and the outer housing is molded on top of it.
Risdon-AMS (Marolles, France) has addressed this challenge as the primary packaging supplier of the Estée Lauder Pure Color eye shadow compact. This compact has the appearance of a clear, slightly melted ice cube, and is made of PMMA. Formes de Luxe magazine recently awarded Risdon-AMS the Prix Formes de Luxe in the plastics category for its role in the development of this package.
The design required Risdon-AMS to match exactly the color of the eye shadow with a PMMA insert in the compact's cover and base. Risdon-AMS engineers had to fine-tune the color of the inserts to compensate for the slight color distortion naturally created by the PMMA outer material. The two inserts together appear as a sphere suspended within the cube.
The manufacturing of this compact involved an array of sophisticated techniques, including overmolding, sonic welding, hot-melt gluing, hot-foil stamping, and custom automation. "The very high—and variable—wall thickness presented a special challenge," explains Gérald Martines, Risdon-AMS's sales directorEurope. "We had to maintain the tight tolerances required to guarantee the package functionality."
In developing a similar compact for Nina Ricci, Toly has replaced overmolding with less-expensive assembly techniques. This compact has a clear outer base and cover cradling an electroplated inner cover and inner base.
"We had to be able to mold in clear and then assemble without being able to weld or glue," explains Sapienza. "It is technically impossible to weld an electroplated part, and glue was not acceptable aesthetically because it would be visible." Toly developed a unique assembly process to trap the molded and electroplated inner parts to the clear-plastic outer cover and base to meet this challenge without the cost of overmolding. Eastar copolyester was selected for this project.
The crystal-like appearance of Zeonor resins from Zeon Chemicals L.P. has attracted the attention of Yutaka Matsui, executive vice president and general manager of Inoac Packaging Group, a provider of cosmetic packaging. Testing at Inoac showed that Zeonor had the toughness and solvent resistance necessary to replace glass for packaging many cosmetic formulations. The first package to be commercialized using Zeonor resins may be a high-end perfume package.
Clear Surlyn was molded into a diamond shaped cap for Chanel's Chance fragrance bottle The trend toward transparency presents challenges for every component of the package, because each is now visible. Rexam Dispensing Systems (Purchase, NY) supplies a customized super-low-profile pump (trademarked as the Crimpless system) for the new Body by Victoria eau de parfum spray from Victoria's Secret Beauty Co. The pump's plastic actuator and collar are made from a specialty resin to achieve a translucent look that complements the spray's translucent cap and bottle. "It was a real challenge for us to develop the exact transparency of the components that Victoria's Secret had in mind," says Dennis Desrochers, vice president of sales and marketing for Rexam Dispensing Systems. "We had not made the Crimpless system SLPP pump collar in a transparent material before, and we had to test various plastic resins and mold cavity textures to achieve the desired result."
Caps can also be fashioned to maintain a luxury bottle's transparent feel. For its Chance fragrance, launched in fall 2002, "Chanel wanted the bottle's circular shape to symbolize a ring and the cap to look like the ring's diamond," says Eric Bigotte, executive vice president for Axilone USA (New York City), which biinjection-molded the Chance cap with beveled edges that resemble the cuts on a diamond.
High-grade Surlyn was used to ensure that the cap's thick walls would still retain a crystal-like clarity. The cap was air cooled to keep its flat walls from sinking as the Surlyn cooled, says Bigotte. The cap also showcases the silver dispenser supplied by Valois (Congers, NY). The Chanel logo was debossed on top of the cap. "The clear cap enhances the bottle's simple yet upscale look," says Bigotte.
Martines agrees that assembling transparent parts creates special challenges. "It's difficult to hide the necessary assembly features, and traditional glues would be visible." To overcome this limitation, Risdon-AMS worked closely with selected glue manufacturers to develop invisible, UV-cured glues, Martines explains. "The glue can sometimes be tuned to approach the refraction index of a large array of transparent resins, like acrylic and copolyesters, so that the interface visibility is diminished or totally removed." This technology was used for the first time by Risdon-AMS to assemble a clear acrylic sleeve for the top of the Couleur Nature mascara vial by Yves Rocher, whose design did not provide any hiding places for classical assembly features. "We have great expectations for this technology. It will allow us to glue a transparent medallion on top of an electroplated part without the bond being visible."
Eastman's Clubb adds that clear materials must stay clear, even after exposure to the product. "Chemical resistance of the resin plays an equally important role." Eastar copolyesters feature such chemical resistance.
Living in a Glass House
Glass, of course, provides the ultimate in transparency. Designers' quests for distinctiveness, however, present other challenges for glass manufacturers. Daniel Saksik is president, Saint-Gobain Desjonquères (SGD) Inc., in the New York office of this French glass manufacturer. Describing the challenges presented by the design for Yves Saint Laurent M7, he says, "When we got this project, at the beginning we didn't know if we could produce even one single bottle with this shape and this color. The very sharp edges of the bottle are very difficult to produce. And the neck of the bottle, being on one side and not in the middle, is also a technical challenge."
Colored glass is SGD's claim to fame. The yellow glass for Yves Saint Laurent M7 was the first of its kind. "This is the first time that any glass maker produced this kind of yellow glass without adding any heavy metals for coloration," Saksik explains.
The firm also produces red glass bottles for Victoria's Secret Very Sexy for Her, Hugo Boss Deep Red, and Christian Dior Fahrenheit, among others. "SGD is the only glass manufacturer to offer red glass in the tank. It is always possible to obtain a red color by lacquering flint glass, but the effect is definitely not the same. More and more, the final consumer wants an extraordinary bottle. Colored glass is a part of this dream."
Looking Back in Glass
While many designers have channeled the public's desire for purity into minimalist designs, some have translated it into a nostalgic quest for the simpler, wholesome beauty products of yesteryear. Vetrerie Bruni S.p.A., an Italian firm manufacturing glass containers designed primarily for food packaging, has capitalized on this trend. The firm's hermetic glass jars with glass lids, gaskets, and wire closures—commonly used for home canning—are now in demand for packaging salt scrubs and exfoliants.
Annie Reyes, sales representative for Vetrerie Bruni USA, was involved 7 or 8 years ago in the development of the firm's first pilot sample for one customer for this type of product. "Typically, cosmetic products are in luxurious packages, with nice silver or gold closures, and they are creamy," she points out. "This product, which is coarse and bumpy, needed to be in something different." The designers wanted consumers to be able to see this product's distinctive physical characteristics through the glass. Furthermore, says Reyes, "These products are in the high-end price range, so the package needs to convey a high price value. The heavy glass gives the impression that there is a lot of product."
Old-fashioned milk bottles, which are still used in Europe for bottling juice and other foodstuffs, are becoming a popular packaging option for milk-based lotions. Vetrerie Bruni has supplied milk bottles for one line of milk-based body-care products. Milk-based products packaged by others include a line from Sephora and the Milk Formula f21c collection from Fresh.
Achieving Special Effects
Manufacturers achieve colorful special effects on plastic parts by two different means. The first is the use of spray surface treatments—UV lacquers or pigmented paint. The second is the development of novel resin compounds.
Novel Resins. Sapienza says Toly is working extensively with color houses to develop proprietary resin formulas with unique properties. Toly now can mold using these novel materials to achieve effects that would have been very difficult to achieve previously—molded metallic or pearlescent colors, or molded colors with more than one pigment (so-called splash colors).
Early prototypes of metallic or pearlescent resins yielded parts with noticeable flow lines, which marred the effect some designers wanted to achieve. Newer techniques allow finer dispersion of the pearlescent or metallic color to eliminate flow lines. Another unique effect Toly is developing in collaboration with a color house is a UV-sensitive material that changes color when exposed to sunlight or indoor light.
Saint-Gobain Desjonquères' propriety red glass creates a striking look for many fragrance bottles, including Hugo Boss Deep Red.
Eastman has extensive color compounding capabilities in house. "We are capable of producing special-effect colors such as metallic colors, pearlescents, fluorescents, stone looks, frosted looks, and bright metallic looks," says Clubb. "The fact that our copolyesters initially are water clear leads to the development of highly chromatic colors in our copolyester compounds."
Surface Treatments.
Manufacturers customize luxury packaging through an array of surface treatments—hot-stamped designs, sprayed lacquers, electroplating, soft-touch finishes, and, one of the newest, 3-D lenticular technology.
There's always a compatibility issue with some surface treatments, Sapienza says, especially with fragrances. Hot stamping, for instance, is susceptible to rubbing and can wear off. When it's protected by a UV lacquer, however, a hot-stamped design is virtually permanent.
Toly used UV lacquers to achieve this protective effect on refillable fragrance packages for Chanel. "Because the packages are refillable, we apply a spray lacquer over the top of the hot-stamped decoration. That way, the decoration is protected from contact with the fragrance, which could otherwise cause deterioration," Sapienza explains, "so the logo stays on forever."
Clear UV lacquers do more than preserve hot-stamped designs. They also enhance a product's scuff resistance. They impart a deeper luster to the molded plastic color, adding a glossier shine.
Techpack combines many techniques when producing the compacts in Guerlain's redesigned Terracotta line. The top plate requires five decorating runs: three four-color screen pad-printing runs produce the partial flame effect, a gloss silver full-tone creates a mirror effect by playing on the screen mesh, and then the double-G logo is gold hot-stamped onto the engraved relief. This decorated plate is welded through ultrasound to the deep-dyed injection-molded case. Techpack then applies a UV lacquer to obtain shiny reflections and protect the case from scratching. "Plastics and metals have always had strong usage in cosmetics packaging. The area of innovation is the surface treatment to make the package even more original," says Daniel Rachmanis, chairman, Techpack America, part of the Pechiney Group based in Paris.
Techpack's latest innovation is lenticular 3-D technology, which it has developed with a partner. "It will allow us to insert some incredible 3-D images to personalize compacts," Rachmanis says.
Manufacturers also combine UV lacquers with vacuum metallizing as an alternative to traditional electroplating. "By using vacuum metallizing and lacquers, you can get a metallic finish in a lot of different colors. With electroplating you also get a metallic finish, but you're limited to a handful of colors," Toly's Sapienza explains.
Risdon-AMS decided to challenge electroplating's limitations by building the most advanced electroplating facility in the industry, and investing significant resources in the technology. "Electroplating remains the Rolls Royce of metallic effects," says Risdon-AMS's Martines. "It offers unparalleled compatibility, high-quality cold-touch, and flawless surfaces. We are expanding its color range with new shades, like a deep black with a mother-of-pearl effect, called Black Pearl, used for the first time for the Chanel Coco and Cristalle refillable sprays. Also available is a pure-white silver finish, called Silver E+, which was used on the recent Vera Wang Blanche line. Its soft, subdued shine closely matches silver without presenting the natural tarnishing problem of real silver." Risdon-AMS is also working on several ways to create an infinite palette with electroplating, the first application being a bluish silver finish for the Avon beComing line.
And Risdon-AMS is now able to offer electroplating finishes priced competitively to vacuum metallizing. "We are proposing that customers convert vacuum-metallized applications to electroplating, like in the case of the Dior Dune pour Homme cap and collar," Martines explains.
Considering Stock Components
Some manufacturers of high-end cosmetics and fragrances have the luxury of unlimited budgets for materials and unlimited time for design and engineering. Most, however, feel some pressure to cut cost or time to market.
Choosing stock components is one way to cut cost and development time. Using stock components reduces the tooling costs that are a prohibitive capital expense for some cosmetics and fragrance manufacturers.
Erin Dutton, sales manager for Inca America Corp. (New York City), explains that the cost of creating a line using stock components may be a fraction of the cost of a custom-engineered line. While Inca has a staff of designers ready to produce custom projects, Dutton says that one of the company's strengths is its extensive line of medium- to high-end stock aluminum components.
Dutton points to the success of Masayume, a cosmetics line by Marbert in Germany. "It is 90% stock, and they made an amazing presentation through a custom color distinctively unique to Masayume."
While decorative techniques are the number one way to customize stock components, Dutton suggests another. "We can incorporate characteristics of several different articles, creating a unique piece to suit the needs of each client," he explains.
Chicago Paper Tube and Can Co. offers another option: paperboard components that simulate the look and feel of higher-ticket items. Chrissy Dudlak explains, "We've been experimenting with papers that simulate the look of more-expensive items—things like suede, leather, brushed aluminum, alligator skin. These papers can achieve the look of a more expensive material." The firm specializes in round and oval paperboard containers for packaging of cosmetics and personal care items. (See more on this subject in "Cosmetic Feature: Beautifying Cosmetic Cartons," by Jennifer Kwok, CPC Packaging, September/October 2002.) Chicago Paper Tube uses this approach to produce a compact covered in paper that has a velvety faux-suede texture.
Toly has attained similar faux finishes, including a new alligator-skin effect used on a European product, on molded-plastic components. Sapienza says Europe has the most innovative techniques. "In the last few years, we haven't had a American customer pioneer a unique finish on a compact. They have been doing the opposite: asking us to take finishes off to save money."