Gen Alpha Packaging Design: How To Target The Younger Generation.

Staying on top of trends is only the start to outperforming your retail competitors. To win on retail shelves, you must understand the nuances of your target demographic and how to reach them with your product packaging. This article will discuss gen alpha packaging design, helping you understand what your package must accomplish to convert this sustainability-conscious and socially aware audience.

From design to messaging, let’s learn how to create attractive packaging that resonates with the alpha generation.  

Why Gen Alpha Matters

The saying “start ’em young” applies to every generation but is especially true for Gen Alphas. One study suggests that preschoolers are already aware of and influenced by brand names. This shouldn’t come as a surprise considering the popularity of games such as Roblox, which are flooded with big-name branding.

Whether you’re a new brand targeting the gen alpha crowd or an existing brand whose millennial or Gen Z consumer has outgrown their product, these consumers impact your bottom line. The “homeland generation” is a consumer set born between 2010 and 2025. Gen a is the first generation to grow up with digital technology at their fingertips. Unless you’re selling exclusively to baby boomers more interested in medical alert systems, you need to welcome Gen Alpha with open arms.

These digital natives are not bound to their local community for awareness and influence. Since their inception, they have been the target of relentless marketing, pushing an agenda of societal issues. They are also the first who are unwilling to accept anything less than a personalized product purchasing approach. 

Importance of packaging design For Generational segments

CPG brands faced distinct challenges from today’s makers of consumer packaged goods. Now, instead of producing faster and cheaper products, brands must learn how to optimize for the following:

1. Increased Product Appeal: Understand a specific generation’s values, preferences, and behaviors. To stand out on retail shelves, a packaging design can no longer hold a mass appeal but take dead aim at the generation most likely to buy your product. Generational targeting is the most efficient way to spread your brand’s message and spreads it to other generations over time.
2. Greater Customer Loyalty: The most dependable way to create a message worth sharing is by aligning with the consumer’s values and interests. Consumer alignment fosters greater customer loyalty, which encourages more repeat purchases.
3. Enhanced brand positioning: Targeting a specific demographic encourages stronger brand positioning, helping to differentiate your product from its competitors. 

Characteristics of Gen Alpha

Generation Alpha’s early technology adoption makes them a more educated consumer audience. The good news is that the alpha generation is less likely to be “tricked” by brands making false promises or glorified claims. Gen A has deemed that honesty, transparency, and consistency are necessary traits in themselves and the brands from whom they purchase products. 

The gen alpha population, closer to the 2010 inception, is already showing their increased desire for entrepreneurship and professional development. This trend is likely to continue and will be influential in shaping our society and economy. With this in mind, CPG brands should consider these two differentiating factors separating Gen alpha from other generations. 

Deeper Understandings

When researching products or validating their purchasing decisions, these digital natives look to the internet or virtual world for product information. As digital technology continues to evolve, gen alpha shoppers will begin their purchasing influence through their phone, watch, or aspects of web 3 such as augmented reality. 

Driven By Experience

Gen alpha will expect more from products than consumption or use. With AI increasingly assuming cognitive demands previously held by human minds, the alpha generation will engage with brands through experiences such as virtual reality. 

How Gen Alpha Differs From Other Generations

Gen alpha may be the first generation whose social awareness of sustainability, social justice, and environmental impact have a purchase interest aligning with on-shelf purchase intent. When this happens, brands must understand consumers’ expectations for their products. They can no longer say, “look at my mediocre social progress,” and will need to find other ways to differentiate their brand in the consumer’s eyes.

Gen alpha is the most innovative generation and wants to support brands creating and contributing to the world around them. Inviting this younger generation into product development and placement are a few ways to integrate their enthusiasm for innovation into your brand strategy.

With access to people across the globe, Gen Alpha is also the most diverse generation to date. From a young age, these consumers experience cultural influences beyond frequenting the local ethnic restaurant down the street. This “worldly view” shapes their values, beliefs, and behaviors differently than previous generations.

Gen Alpha Purchasing Decisions

Across generations, purchasing decisions don’t change entirely. There are certainly millennials and Gen X consumers who care about the environment and social causes. But each segment of the consumer market holds a scale weighing these purchasing decisions differently.

Access and age demographics influence Gen alpha purchasing decisions differently than previous generations causing the scale to lean less on “low prices” and more on “connection and impact.” Key factors influencing the purchasing decisions of Gen Alpha shoppers include:

• Sustainable packaging: There’s hope for our future generations. We expect Gen Alpha to be the generation most strongly emphasizing sustainability and environmental consciousness. Gen A consumers are more likely to purchase a product based on naturally sourced environmentally friendly packaging safely obtained and returned to the planet. 
• Plant-based ingredients: With consumers becoming more health conscious and innovation happening faster than ever, this generation will normalize plant-based consumption as a more natural (and healthy) option.
• Personalization: Brands seeking a premium rejoice! Gen Alpha shoppers are willing to spend more money to support their values and beliefs. To align, premium product pricing requires brands to commit to positive global impact. 
• Parental & Child Influence: A positive of this generation is the yin and yang influence between the millennial parent and their Gen Alpha child. Whether it’s kids with the front of their shirts tucked in or Gen z parents lip singing on TikTok, there is integration between the parent and their child. The duality of influence affirms the need to target parents who make the final purchase decision. 

Packaging design Testing for Gen Alpha Consumers

With the demand for product differentiation and meeting category acceptance, consumer testing is more important than ever. You might assume vibrant and bold colors is the right move, but you’d be wrong. Package design testing determines the most critical design elements and messages on your packaging.

What doesn’t fit on the package may be better served as bullet benefits for your ecommerce store or online experience with or without smart packaging. 

Gen Alpha Packaging Design Case studies

To illustrate these points, let’s look at two case studies: a successful cosmetic packaging design and a food packaging design.

Our first example is 808 dude, which sells a line of vegan, plant-based skincare products. Their packaging design effectively targets Gen Alpha by featuring bright, bold colors and a modern design, incorporating eco-friendly materials and messaging about their sustainability efforts. 

This skincare packaging design speaks to the values and interests of Gen Alpha, and with the right marketing strategy, 808 Dude will continue to grow in popularity.

The next example is This Saves Lives, which features a line of kid snacks anyone can enjoy. Their kid-friendly packaging design features their company branding, a three-word mission statement acting as a purchase driver. This CPG brand has decided to leave out the product’s many sustainable and healthy aspects to let the most impactful purchase driver shine.

This packaging design targets both the millennial mother and the Gen Alpha child. With enough shelf presence, we expect this bar to have rockin’ revenues.

Conclusion

In conclusion, understanding and targeting specific demographics is vital in effective packaging design. For Gen Alpha, packaging design incorporating vibrant colors, technology and interactive elements, sustainability, and personalization can be highly effective in driving sales. By keeping these considerations in mind, businesses can effectively market to Gen Alpha and stand out in a crowded marketplace.

Packaging Design Guaranteed To Perform.

Are you ready to build a best-selling brand? Our full-stack package design process guarantees shelf performance; whether it’s a new product, brand extension, or packaging redesign, we can help. The data collected through our package design testing ensures that you exceed the retailer’s slot revenue expectations. Book a time to speak with our packaging design agency.