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How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?

bootcamp.uxdesign.cc

191–200 of 278 posts

Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?

#191
post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>he point was about American consumers, who are buying reconstituted concentrate anyways (just that someone's done the reconstituting for them They aren't. Over 90% of orange juice sold in the US is not from concentrate.

not from concentrate does not mean it isnt reconstituted. its just that instead of removing the water to preserve it they remove the oxygen. deaeration removes more flavor than dehydration, so they must be put back in. thats why tropicana tastes more like orange juice than orange juice

I keep reading this here but this is forbidden by law in France (as they call it "100% pur jus"). They could add vitamin C if they wanted but they don't seem to, given the nutritional data.

Is Tropicana juice different in the US and in the EU?

Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?

#192
post #133

I looked at the title, opened the link, searched for “Peter Arnell,” got zero results, and knew the article was total garbage. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/arnells-explanation-of-failed-t... I had a close friend who worked on a project where they brought this guy in. Charged $1m a month and invoiced his jet fuel to the company, if I remember correctly. Now you know where the $30M actually went. The article is an exam…

yes. But it was $65 million. $35m for the idiotic design. and $30m in lost sales when it stopped people buying it.

Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?

#193

What seems to be lost in these “redesigns” is the why : why are you doing it? If there isn’t a list of benefits long enough to justify the cost and possible risk, well, that’s a problem. There’s also a tendency for companies to be super proud of what they’ve done so they neglect methods like A/B testing and instead just bet the farm on their great new design. After all, it cost a lot of money and looks cool to the de…

> What seems to be lost in these “redesigns” is the why: why are you doing it? If there isn’t a list of benefits long enough to justify the cost and possible risk, well, that’s a problem.

I ask that to myself every single time I update my mac or pixel 3 phone.

The UX gets worse and worse every year, and just when you finally start to get used to it they decide to change things again.

I guess they need to keep internal teams busy 24/7. I've seen it in many companies, people keep throwing A/B tests, see what seem to improve the experience by negligible amount (most of the time their tests are skewed anyways so it doesn't really matter), then they spent millions and hundreds of man hours to move a few buttons and make a few lines of text bigger/smaller. When they deploy it the impact is either inexistent or negative, people get fired, new managers get hired, and they start again.

Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?

#194
post #133

I looked at the title, opened the link, searched for “Peter Arnell,” got zero results, and knew the article was total garbage. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/arnells-explanation-of-failed-t... I had a close friend who worked on a project where they brought this guy in. Charged $1m a month and invoiced his jet fuel to the company, if I remember correctly. Now you know where the $30M actually went. The article is an exam…

But Indont think this is about "some guy came up with a crap design". It strikes me a number of things went badly 1. I think C-level execs at major corporations should have built up immunity against such bullshit. 2. The heatmap (plus the associated idea of lots of consumer testing) should have spotted something 3. the rollout seems to have been global and immediate, instead of for example testing the new packaging o…

I think the heatmap was done by the ones who did the article :)

Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?

#195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand your comment about the apples, why wouldn't apples be in the produce department?

"Honey Crisp Apples" sounds like a cereal, presumably.

I think Apple Honey Crisp was a cereal at one point...

And the Honey Crisp apple is very new. Even though released in the 1990s, it takes decades for production to grow, and, for other regions to get cultivars and start selling them too.

Then on top of all that, for most people to even know about new apple flavours, it must compete for space at the grocery...

Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?

#196
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I have lost, literally lost things I liked to buy at the grocery, due to changed packaging. One time I had to Google images for a 20 minutes to find old images, then write down the brand/ type. Another, the package changed, and the new package stated some strange "new" ingredient, which left me struggling to know if the flavour changed. I honestly would just prefer a package never changes for my entire life. Edi…

If you're not aware, "New and improved" generally means the product was changed to reduce ingredient costs. So hopefully I've ruined the "meaning" for you.

Yes, but not reduce my angst.

Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?

#197
Carton design, or not, I don't buy orange juice anymore because I don't know what "Made from Real Oranges*" means anymore. Over time, I came to learn that straightforward claims like these are engineered to deceive. Tropicana could use 100% real oranges, and I still wouldn't believe them.

I could inspect the ingredients, and even then, it's dubious- companies have found ways to circumvent the rules there too. Instead of all this mental gymnastics I have to do at the grocery store, I just decided to abandon the product completely.

Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?

#199

Carton design, or not, I don't buy orange juice anymore because I don't know what "Made from Real Oranges*" means anymore. Over time, I came to learn that straightforward claims like these are engineered to deceive. Tropicana could use 100% real oranges, and I still wouldn't believe them. I could inspect the ingredients, and even then, it's dubious- companies have found ways to circumvent the rules there too. Instead…

I would be suspicious of any orange juice where the company feels the need to stipulate "real orange juice". What the heck else would it be made of?

Reminds me of "ice cream" which, in a lot of cases, is not. Mixed in the ice cream section next to identical looking cartons of different flavors Breuer's is a big culprit) are things that say "whipped dairy dessert" in the place that others say "ice cream".

Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?

#200
post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For a lot of websites I visit frequently what I want is ease of use and familiarity. Redesigns are often a bother since I need to learn to navigate the new site. For sites I don't visit as often I likely won't really notice a redesign.

As a counterpoint, Facebook got criticism for each redesign but if they kept their 2001 aesthetic it would look and feel incredibly dated now.

Craig's List looks dated, but remains incredibly functional and is still the top site in its segment. Its dated look doesn't scare people away. It is still very functional. That's the important part.
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