Packaging innovation is important for most brand owners; 86% of those surveyed recently say that marketing, branding, and packaging have a heightened role in product marketing efforts today. However, the processes that lead to innovation are either lacking or need to be refined to encourage creativity and bring new ways of doing things into the package-creation process.

So says a new survey from Paxonix, a MeadWestvaco company, produced with Consumer Goods Technology magazine. The survey data was developed in early 2008 and summarized in a report called Branding and Packaging: Processes Ripe for Improvement and Automation. Data used in the report came from a survey of top marketing executives and explored how packaging and branding processes contribute to new-product success.

The study determined "speed to market" as the most important business driver among the respondents. Another 32% suggested that "lack of time" was the main inhibitor to innovation in designing and developing branding and packaging strategies.

"Innovation has to be part of the overall process of providing product to the market," says Kent St. Vrain, Vice President, Marketing and Business Development, at Paxonix. "However, it relies on having enough time in the process for innovative ideas to appear and be refined, tested, and implemented. With the pressures of speed to market, quality improvement, and a reduction in rework, it is clear that current processes do not contain this extra time."

Respondents also identified collaboration as essential to successful branding and packaging processes. However, when asked to enumerate the major obstacles, 30% respondents noted the existence of "too many revision cycles," as well as logistics and communication issues, another concern was issue of working in separate locations.

"Most processes in the marketing, branding, and packaging functions stifle creativity by having the people in the process spend too much time on administration rather than utilizing the creativity of employees," St. Vrain says. "Consumer packaged goods organizations that leverage automated packaging and brand asset management tools can help ease the burden of administration and free up employees to focus on innovation."