3 day project coming up with initial concept routes for The Grown Up Chocolate Company.
The Brief
Design the box and outer sleeve wrap for The Grown Up Chocolate Company’s exciting new product that allows customers to customise their own chocolate bars, sold in sets of three.
“The aim is to take the chocolate we enjoyed so much as children, and add inventive and more sophisticated twists to create chocolate bars more in tune with the adult palette. That being said, humour is an important part of our personality, and our “it’s not for kids” packaging appeals to our adult audience in a playful way.”
The Concepts
1. Nostalgia
Nostalgia for the golden years of childhood is common amongst adults, but it seems that all Brits miss similar things. Studies suggest that British adults miss the simple life the most, highlighting design opportunities to revert them back to their childish ways, offering them a nostalgic moment to ease the ‘stress of adult life’ and momentarily, relive simpler times.
2. Prove it
Experience separates adults from children, offering the perfect opportunity to expose a divide between the two groups and highlight the ‘grown-up’ audience.
Nostalgia Route 1
In response to the insight that smell and touch are strong evokers of nostalgia I considered what interactive qualities the motion of sliding the box open and shut reminded me of within the theme of nostalgia and came across the idea of pulling a record out of a record sleeve.
A subtle reference to the nostalgic idea of records; the exterior of the packaging reflects a record sleeve. The window in the top of the packaging (to reveal the record etc) is cut out, revealing the chocolate content inside. On the base of the interior, visible once the chocolate bars are removed, is an illustration of a record that will show through the window in the sleeve to introduce the idea of play and interactivity with the packaging.
Nostalgia Route 2
The packaging reflects childhood and introduces nostalgia through the design and physicality of favourite childhood board games. The vintage visuals are important to the design, in order to encourage memories from adults, rather than attract children with the idea of chocolate and games.
The exterior of the box resembles board game packaging from the 70s-90s. When opened and the chocolate bars removed, the interior of the box becomes a version of the board game itself. This gives the packaging a longevity and a 2nd life, whilst interacting with the game will bring back childhood memories: reminiscent of childhood,
re-imagined for grown ups.
Included underneath the chocolate are two cards (reflective of flavour cards normally found in chocolate boxes). One will contain rules for the game to give it context, and the other will include pop out counters and a dice to build. They should be provided in this flat-pack format so as not to interrupt the composition and placement of the chocolate inside the box.
Prove It Route 1
The concept visualises the idea of child deterrents; bringing to life the things that as children we are always warned not to do: playing with matches, playing with knives, watching scary or explicit content, sticking fingers in sockets etc etc...
Rather than explicitly showing these things, they have been alluded to through recognisable hazard symbols and language (speaking to the adults) and by using chocolate as the ‘subject’. This aims to maintain the light hearted tone of the brand and humorous nature, whilst reiterating the brand’s concept of ‘not for kids.’
