1. Welcome

Hi, and welcome to Product Packaging and Profit, where we help product-based businesses turn packaging design into a competitive edge to attract customers, grow sales, and boost profits.

I'm Kelley Kempel, After 20 years of designing packaging for national retailers, I founded Hidden Path Creative, a graphic design studio that supports entrepreneurs with branding and packaging to get their products seen and sold. I'm sharing the secrets that launched big brands so your products can stand out.  Let's get started.

This episode of Product Packaging and Profit is sponsored by the Packaging Printer List.

If there is one question I've heard from almost every product entrepreneur I've talked to, it is, where can I get my packaging printed?

No, really, If we were on Family Feud, this would be the answer at the top of the board. The Packaging Printer list is a curated directory of over 45 packaging printers and suppliers across various product categories, packaging types, and locations.

I've handpicked all of the entries so you can be sure you're starting with a vetted shortlist. To grab your copy of the packaging printer list, head over to www.hiddenpathcreative.com/packagingprinterlist.

Hi everyone. Welcome to the very first episode of Product Packaging and Profit. I am so excited to start this podcast as a long-time podcast listener.

I never really thought that I would have my own podcast, but as I've been thinking of different ways to connect with my audience and share these really great packaging tips that can help product today's businesses, a podcast just seemed like the natural fit.

So in today's episode, we're gonna cover a little bit about me, why I started this podcast and what you can expect from the podcast going forward.

In 2020, I started Hidden Path Creative. We're a graphic design studio that works with product-based businesses, and we love helping owners craft their branding and packaging design to help support their vision and sell their products.

We've had clients in so many different product categories. some of our favorites are skincare and beauty, home decoring gifts, food, and beverage.

But really the list just keeps growing and that's really something that I love about product-based businesses is that you know, it's never been easier to start your own product business.

And there are so many people who have ideas for new products and just wanna get them out there. They, you know, they just thought of something that could help them help themselves or a family member or a friend in their everyday life, and they went out and made that product, got it produced.

And so in branding and packaging, we really helped tell that story, which is just so, so exciting. before starting the business, I was a designer and a creative leader with national retailers.

First I was at Dick's Sporting Goods, and then most recently I was at Kohl's department stores. Both of those companies have their own private brands and lines of products that they produce under those brands.

And so I really had the opportunity to learn branding and packaging as it related to their product categories and how to really make products stand out against national brands in these larger retail stores.

So I got to create brand identities, work with existing brands, and then do all sorts of different product packaging across the board.

I was able to work with incredible national brands like Maxfli, Food Network, and Nine West. It's really interesting how these retailers partner with known brands to create product lines, and a lot of times the branding and packaging are done in-house with the retailer.

So definitely an amazing opportunity. And, you know, when you work with a brand like Food Network that's got such an expansive brand and you know, they're across all these different touchpoints because you're carrying their branding from television to a tangible product and a tangible product package, and you really want those things to be cohesive, yet serve their own purpose.

You learn a lot about how to infuse emotion and meaning but also sell a product at the same time.

So that was definitely, a really, you know, these experiences of working with these national brands that may not have had product lines and then turning them into, uh, product brands at these retailers was super cool.

And then you look at something like, Nine West, which was a dream brand to work on for me, where the brand was, is synonymous with shoes.

If you are a professional woman and somebody says nine West, you immediately think of their shoes. But I was able to work with the team to create a visual brand identity and packaging that really expressed that same feeling, but brought it into the apparel category.

So creating that feeling of the fresh professional, but with like, with a really stylish edge and then bringing that into the apparel space meant keeping that brand consistent while coming up with ideas to show really the brand's story in a really quick way through the packaging.

So definitely, definitely one of the highlights for me, and maybe I'll have to do a full episode on that later, but I think I, you know, I started to mention this, I love working with owners of product-based businesses.

So as I've started working directly with clients over the past two years, the people that are coming up with ideas for their own products are so passionate about what they're doing.

They're putting this into everything that they're making. And so to work with people that are so passionate about their products and what they can do for our customers is really inspiring.

And when you look across the marketplace, when you look across the product marketplace, in particular, the innovation in products is happening with the small businesses, with the new entrepreneurs coming onto the scene because they couldn't find a product that met their needs.

They had a need, they looked for something, but they couldn't find it, so they made it themselves. You know, they might have, you know, pulled it together in their kitchen or in their garage, and then they use it and it's really great.

And all of a sudden, neighbors and friends and family are like, Where did you get that? Can you make that for me?

And it starts to snowball. And those are the most interesting and, you know, fresh products that are coming out into the market.

So it, it's so exciting to get to, to get to tell those stories and, uh, help those products come to market.

All right, So what does this product, this podcast, all about? All right, so what is this show all about? In the last 10 years, there has been an absolute explosion in direct-to-consumer product brands.

And I think we've all seen it with, the pandemic that we've all turned more to online shopping to eCommerce.

And eCommerce is the primary way that a lot of new product business owners have been able to break into the industry

And the internet really has been a huge tool for that, not just for the eCommerce, but for the ability of, you know, almost everybody.

Anyone in this country could go out and start a product line today using the internet because you have access to suppliers and manufacturers that you never had before.

You have access to drop shipping and print on demand, and you have access to just find those resources, those manufacturers, those weight label vendors that were really only open to bigger businesses before it wasn't open to individual people.

And whether it's a handmade product or you're working to source a product with a manufacturer or a co-packer, one of the biggest questions that I hear is, Okay, I figured out how to make this product, but how do I package it and how do I get it to market so that people understand what it is?

And so knowing that branding and packaging can really take a product and help it to stand up against products that are already on the market, packaging and branding can help connect with customers and explain your product.

It can help elevate pricing. So knowing all of those things and seeing firsthand how that branding and packaging can really transform a business and take a product idea from a great product to a great selling product, I wanna share that knowledge with as many entrepreneurs as possible.

I want all of you that are in your kitchens and in your garages coming up with these new product ideas to have access to the information to tell your story and get your product seen and sold.

So that's really what's inspired me to start this podcast and get this information out there to you. And I'm so excited to do that.

Okay, so what to expect, you've heard me talk a lot today and you know, there will be a fair amount of episodes that will be just me sharing tips and tricks and things that I've seen going on out in the marketplace, but I also want to bring in other experts that work directly with product based businesses.

I think that there is this intersection between branding and design and other service providers that can really help, connect those dots between product, packaging and profit.

So the types of people that you may hear join me on this podcast are photographers, Shopify designers, brand strategists, and other product business owners, hearing their stories, hearing how they've created their incredible products or built, sold-out launches.

I definitely want this to be kind of a multifaceted conversation around these three topics of product, packaging, and profit. So we'll be coming to your feed every other week, and if you wanna be the first to know about our new episodes, you can join the Hidden Path creative email list.

The website to do that would be hiddenpathcreative.com/podcast. We've got a form there just for our podcast listeners that want to get the updates.

As soon as our new podcast episodes drop. I wanna thank you for listening to the Product, Packaging, and Profit podcast for product entrepreneurs looking to level up with packaging.

We hope you'll drive us next time to hear more about how packaging can help propel profitable product businesses. If you enjoyed the show, please rate and review us wherever you're listening.

And be sure to come back in two weeks for our next episode.

Until then, this is Kelley Kempel of Hidden Path Creative. And don't forget what's on the outside matters too!