Kellogg’s Special K line of cereals come in packages ranging
in quality from mediocre to acceptable. While it’s difficult to outline what exactly
is lacking, their designs indisputable could be improved. For now, we’ll focus
on the shortcomings of the “fruit and yogurt” edition.
Why the packaging of these cereals are so feminine escapes
me. Maybe they cut a deal with the bacon and eggs advertising department, but
this product has appeal to both sexes at its heart, and still it incorporates
soft, low-intensity colors and non-threatening curves (notice the giant K).
Over the likes of Cinnamon Toast Crunch (diabetes in a box), Special K has
potential with the health conscious crowd, but to this end it’s a bit overdone.
It looks like something your doctor might prescribe. The design is needlessly cluttered
with graphics and information. Furthermore, the package could benefit from a
consistent color theme rather than blue, white, red, purple, a bit of black,
and some shades of tan.
However, the current Special K design’s failings are most
obvious when held against a proposed design from student Mun Joo Jane. This project
offers a unique, cylindrical package with a bolder and more focused theme.
Altogether it makes for a much more appealing product.
While the boxed package comes off cluttered, distinctly feminine,
and slightly childish, Jane’s creation is refreshingly simple yet innovative,
universally appealing, and mature. The “tube” boasts consistent reds and blacks
on a simple white background that allows our focus to travel to where it really
matters. The Gestalt law of pragnanz suggests a human preference for simplicity,
and this product takes advantage of this to a much greater degree than the box.
Opposite the current design, the tube is gender neutral, and strong, with a
bold K+ replacing a dated, glossy K. This product refuses to buy into the way
cereal is typically marketed toward children with bright colors and a collage
of graphics (a smart move given how kids would probably react to the taste of the
stuff). It isn’t specifically a man’s breakfast or a woman’s breakfast, but it’s
got a sense of order that makes it an adult’s breakfast. Even though the
Kellogg’s logo is smaller on Jane’s design, it still preserves brand identity
better given that it’s one of very few graphics, and a red one at that,
contrasting a clean, white base.
Although Kellogg’s design exhibits texture by presenting an
enlarged image of rough, gritty flakes, the alternative accomplishes the same
thing with a transparent window that lets the product speak for itself, and
there’s a charismatic sense of honesty and genuineness to that. Plus, the
cereal contrasts better against a white background than a cluttered, purple
mess.
All in all, this student-designed product would have my eyes
and wallet well before the current, so-so packaging due to its elegance, simplicity,
and incorporation of design principles.