Comments on: 10 Absolutely Pathetic Packaging Fails

By: john

john — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 21:13:18 +0000

While I can agree with you on almost all of these, the roses are packaged in this manner for a number of reasons; the thick cardboard wrapper is to insulate the roses, the bottoms of which are stored in ice, wrapped in newspaper. The cuffs you see around the individual buds prevent them from bruising during transport.
The next time that you decide to play the romantic part and send for a dozen roses for your sweetheart, consider just how much of a pain it is to get those ludicrously delicate little flowers all wired up and preened for show.

By: tim

tim — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 16:51:25 +0000

I used to work in distribution and a lot of times the reason we would ship small items in large boxes had nothing to do with being stupid or wasteful. In fact, all of the over sized boxes that we used for smaller items had already been used for another shipment (returns, repackaging etc.). So 90% of the time we are already using recycled material instead of wasting money and buying both big boxes and small boxes.. but the bananas… I’m not really sure what the hell is going on there.

By: Robin Kirk, CPP

Robin Kirk, CPP — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 19:55:13 +0000

you are very ignorant of the principlas of packging design and why the products you ahve shown needed the packaging used to survive the shipping environmnet and abuse in order to arrive as sweet as a rose and as juicy as a “not complemetly dried” fruit.

maybe you should do some research before you share your observations. Not understaning production and processes rquired by industry really shows in most of your comments.

By: Petelite

Petelite — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 18:38:39 +0000

The more packaging the better! This is how my housemate and I heat our house.

By: christina chicago usa

christina chicago usa — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 05:45:05 +0000

gee i sorta wish i could get one of those pallets. kidding aside,
who pays for the shipping of all that excess waste? what does a pallet weigh these days?
it could be fun and useful if there was a clearing house/website with info or links to company HQ in order to protest this sort of crap. i just am grateful that bananas are sold “au naturel” here because i complain to the produce guy often enough as is.

thanks.

By: Barry

Barry — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 21:14:44 +0000

Ah, good ol’ HP. I used to work for them in their server factory. Because of “standardized packaging processes” we were always putting small things in big boxes. None of those pictures of HP packages surprised me.

By: Raine

Raine — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 18:09:52 +0000

I work in a lab and I wish I could show you the nonsense packaging we receive daily. Mostly from fisher scientific, but all the other companies as well. It is terrible.

By: Jill Bratcher

Jill Bratcher — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 16:15:12 +0000

QVC and Office Depot are just as bad.

From QVC I received two packs of Star Trek collector cards (total space of one is 3″widex4″longx3″deep), each in a 6″x9″x4″ box full of styrofoam peanuts; both of THOSE boxes were together inside a 11″x19″x7″deep larger box, also with more peanuts. Then I received two comforters (package measured about 20″x20″x10-12″deep), each in their own 21″-cubed box; they charged me $8+ to ship one of them and double that for the other one. I was able to ship both back in one box when I returned them.

We get packages from Office Depot via UPS with our office/kitchen supplies. Sometimes we get three boxes when the items could have fit into one. They will send one printer cartridge in a box the size of the one those two Star Trek card packs came in with gobs of “airpacks” in them.

Columbia House is the most efficient shipper; their packaging is sturdy enough to protect the DVDs but there’s no extra space/filler. Amazon does *pretty* well about not oversizing the box/adding lots of filler.

By: Lauren

Lauren — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 14:52:25 +0000

Though the roses look particularly sad, I can at least understand that they are very delicate and might need that sort of protection for long distance travel or what-not. The HP stuff is both appalling and hilarious, not really in a good way!

By: Peter

Peter — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 09:42:57 +0000

A good, bad list… if you get my drift:)