London Packaging Week 2024: Innovations in personal care packaging with smart and circular solutions

05 Sep 2024 --- Key brands from beauty and cosmetics to food and fashion will be at the London Packaging Week trade show. 

Next week’s event will showcase industry innovations in sustainable packaging through tailored solutions driven by consumer insights from companies such as PZ Cussons, a personal healthcare products and consumer goods provider and British fragrance brand Molton Brown.

Top trends include a shift toward recyclable and compostable materials, smart packaging technologies and increased cross-industry collaboration. With Easyfairs UK organizing the event next week, Personal Care Insights connects with senior marketing manager James Montero MacColl to discuss how businesses are leveraging consumer insights to drive sustainable cosmetic packaging innovations. Montero MacColl also addresses the evolving role of packaging technologists and the growing importance of circular economy principles.

How are companies like PZ Cussons leveraging consumer insights to drive sustainable packaging innovations and what challenges do they face?
Montero MacColl: Like many multinational businesses, PZ Cussons realized there is no one-size-fits-all solution that meets consumer needs across the diverse markets they operate in. This means they use insights to develop tailored solutions that can meet consumer expectations and are also compatible with the waste management infrastructure in each region.

Easyfairs UK’s senior marketing manager James Montero MacColl.These differences in consumer awareness and recycling readiness must be balanced against the cost and technological challenges that arise when developing packaging. Ultimately, the challenges faced by PZ Cussons are the same as those facing the entire packaging industry at the moment. This is why the insights and solutions on display at London Packaging Week are so important.

In what ways do you think the role of packaging technologists will evolve in the next five years?
Montero MacColl: These roles will continue to grow in prominence as the industry innovates to deliver on its priorities. The emphasis on sustainability means the role will likely end up influencing industries outside of packaging. For example, the development of water-based barrier coatings for packaging could have implications for many different applications.

We’ll also see the role incorporate more digital and smart technologies as we move into the Industry 4.0 era. Smart packaging that uses QR codes, Near Field Communication and Radio Frequency Identification tags to blend the physical and digital worlds to unlock new efficiencies through the supply chain and whole new avenues to engage and delight consumers.

What are some key innovations or materials that you anticipate will dominate discussions at this year’s London Packaging Week Innovation Awards?
Montero MacColl: When it comes to sustainable packaging materials, less is more. The industry has largely moved onto a more holistic view of sustainability, which accepts that there is no such thing as a truly ‘eco-friendly’ material. The best you can hope for is to use as little material as possible while still ensuring the finished pack delivers from an aesthetic and functional performance perspective. As a result, we’ve seen a significant trend toward designing out waste by using fewer materials where possible.

Having said that, there is also a definite move away from single-use plastics and toward recyclable or compostable alternatives. Paper-based and bioplastic innovations will have a big presence this year, a continuing theme that has built up over the last few years.

You might think these trends limit other design elements, but that isn’t true. We’ve seen some outstanding submissions that play with shapes, materials and textures to deliver an unforgettable sensory experience.

How are brands like Molton Brown integrating circular economy principles, and what impact do you think such efforts will have on consumer perceptions of luxury and premium products?
Montero MacColl: Molton Brown has developed its own closed-loop system where consumers can return plastic bottles, caps and pumps to be recycled. This approach is becoming increasingly common as mainstream recycling infrastructure still struggles to accommodate items like soft plastics. Packaging is central to these strategies, as it makes sense to develop solutions that can either be reused or recycled efficiently.

Consumers now know that packaging made with sustainability in mind doesn’t equate to a lower-quality product.The luxury industry has traditionally walked its own path when it comes to trends. In this case, however, we’ve seen luxury consumers take sustainability just as seriously as consumers in other sectors. A Deloitte survey found that 57% of luxury consumers consider sustainability factors when making a purchase, and as many of the biggest brands in the sector have set ambitious sustainability targets of their own, we only expect this number to grow.

Consumers now know that packaging made with sustainability in mind doesn’t equate to a lower-quality product, so the benefits of sustainable design will continue to have a positive impact on product perception.

How do cross-industry collaborations play in advancing packaging technologies to meet environmental goals and consumer demands?
Montero MacColl: The future will be built on collaboration. No one business or individual can face the challenges the future will bring alone. Events like London Packaging Week are made to facilitate these productive partnerships. We always say everyone leaves the show with something, whether it’s a new deal, a new contact or just a spark of inspiration about their next big project.

We build a diverse lineup of speakers, ranging from brand owners to regulators, to provide insights that you can’t hear anywhere else. Our networking events are designed to facilitate conversations and collaboration. And, of course, there’s the show floor itself, which is packed with experts and innovations around every corner. 

Perhaps most exciting of all, it offers a glimpse of the future in the form of our innovation gallery, where visitors can see the ideas that will shape the future of packaging for themselves and connect with the people behind those ideas. 

By Venya Patel