GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) operates in healthcare products, which the design community considers to be possibly the last remaining section of the store in which packaging is generally falling short of its potential for impacting sales. GSK is one of the healthcare community's design leaders. A recent example: Packaging for its new alli over-the-counter (OTC) weight-loss brand provides some of the emotional support women need to get through a weight-loss program.

One focus of the product delivery system is the "Shuttle," a blue pill case included in the alli that women can carry with them to provide discreet, convenient compliance. How does GSK innovate effectively in the OTC arena? The company is making a commitment to innovation and enhancing speed to market with the development of innovation "hubs." Donna Sturgess, GSK Global Head of Innovation, described how the hubs work at the recent Pharmapack show in Paris, France.

"If your work touches one of our global assets, you are moved into the innovation hub," Sturgess explained. Team members working in the hub include marketers sitting next to the R&D, packaging, and regulatory departments. GSK has found that by placing people in this manner in a creative space, the larger group can make significant gains in the way they innovate.

"If you are seminal to the operation of the brand, you are seated in the hub," Sturgess said. "E-mails have gone down, and the speed of decision-making has increased by 45 percent. The R&D people say things to me like, 'We actually know what's going on around the project.' The use of all players to inform decisions is up 18 percent since we moved to the innovation-hub model."

Sturgess further explained, "This has been extremely powerful to us in terms of driving our innovation agenda, and I think you can imagine how quickly it begins to change your speed to innovate, because you are without this structure of all these formal meetings and tons of e-mails."

How does this approach affect the role of packaging? "Packaging is at the very inception of the innovation," Sturgess said. "It's not an afterthought. "It isn't that marketing turns up and says, 'We want you to create a package for this,' and the packaging person says, 'A year and a half ago, I could have given you many more options, but now your options are very limited.' With this structure, we can now operate teams in a way that everybody is there at the beginning of the innovation process. And everybody can make a positive contribution to the innovation."

By Jim Chrzan, Publisher