Live data from Hacker News

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

bootcamp.uxdesign.cc

201–210 of 278 posts

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

#201

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…

Juice in general just seems terribly unhealthy in 2022. I enjoy it as a treat now and again but think of it more like a dessert rather than a part of my daily breakfast routine.

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

#202
post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup. The "Why?" question gets lost among the impulse to be 'clean and modern'. >>Tropicana’s original packaging had rich colours and a strong visual hierarchy. On the other hand, the new packaging failed to impress the consumers, with clean lines, a lack of visuals, transforming the once indistinguishable orange juice into a “generic store brand” product. This same thing happens in everything else too, such as automo…

> The damn "designers" are so infatuated with their "principles" of design and aesthetics I agree with your main point, but I have a small objection to this phrase. I don't think principles of design tells you to not care about usability/function. In fact, a good design is aesthetics AND function, as argued in "The Design of Everyday Things"[1]. So in this case, the designers are simply not doing their job. They've b…

[deleted]

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

#203
post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup. The "Why?" question gets lost among the impulse to be 'clean and modern'. >>Tropicana’s original packaging had rich colours and a strong visual hierarchy. On the other hand, the new packaging failed to impress the consumers, with clean lines, a lack of visuals, transforming the once indistinguishable orange juice into a “generic store brand” product. This same thing happens in everything else too, such as automo…

> The damn "designers" are so infatuated with their "principles" of design and aesthetics I agree with your main point, but I have a small objection to this phrase. I don't think principles of design tells you to not care about usability/function. In fact, a good design is aesthetics AND function, as argued in "The Design of Everyday Things"[1]. So in this case, the designers are simply not doing their job. They've b…

Agree, I should have specified "aesthetic principles" (vs "'principles' of design and aesthetics").

Yes, the actual great designers put function first, then solve the now-harder problem of simplifying the aesthetics without sacrificing the function.

Had an architect (trained, licensed, etc.) propose a redesigned front porch and put a support post right square in front of an existing bay window. Sure, from the front elevation view, it looked great, but squarely blocked the view from inside. Also proposed just building the wrap=around part without moving a natgas meter, just left it obstructing part of the side entry. What a waste of time and money - she just solved the problems she wanted to solve (e.g., make it look good in her drawing) and ignored all the other problems - and was proud of that.

This is the problem - real design is hard because it includes ALL the problems and the constraints they create. Too many (I'd say most, in my experience), just focus on the problems they want to solve, ignore the rest, and think they've done a good job, when in fact they completely failed. And the real problem is management that accepts that crap as completed work and pushes it out on the customers.

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

#204

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".

One common-ish case would be from concentrate, since ostensibly it is just the water removed and then re added. However, you're at that point substituting the natural water for whatever is at the bottling source.

This does lead me to an interesting question, that being whether one could make orange juice from frozen concentrate that is 'better' than store bought and reconstituted at a factory

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

#205
The article misses the most important point in those cases: how did the team miss that?

It's very easy to predict the past and find errors when you know the result.

It fricking hard to find errors in your reasoning right now. Why did they think that would work? What did they miss? What error got into their reasoning? Was this destined to fail or it was just bad luck? Could it have worked?

I'd love to read about that kind of stuff.

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

#206

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".

I wonder if the same health equivalency applies to jam and it’s analogues. There’s double-fruit jam that doesn’t identify as jam, but as a fruit spread.

It seems like a healthier choice, due to higher bulk of fruit purée versus standard jam on toast (which I assume has more sugar).

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

#207

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".

There are surprisingly strict rules about ice cream terminology pertaining to ingredient ratios. Is it ice cream? Ice milk? Custard? Etc. An ice cream-like product that is not actually "ice cream" is not necessarily inferior.

With orange juice... not sure. There's long been the distinction between "from concentrate" and "not from concentrate", but both were still considered actual orange.

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

#209
post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"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...

There has to be like 20-30 types of apples now. I can't keep track.
Post reply on HN