reading stephen fenichell’s plastic about polymer history i was amazed by the story of cellophane. initially useless, it took some clever marketing to find a market for the transparent film. first, camel used it to wrap packs of cigarettes and ‘lock in flavor’ to regain market from lucky strike. then, cellophane became used for wrapping all sorts of products, in part because of a marketing campaign that stressed (invented) the dirtiness of un-wrapped goods. to quote from one campaign:
…strange hands – inquisitive hands – dirty hands – touching, feeling, examining the things you buy in stores. your sure protection against hands-across-the-counter is touh, clear, germ-proof Cellophane…
in fact, wrapping foodstuff in cellophane had distinct advantages for sellers: food could be kept edible longer and people could be forced to buy larger quantities of food by offering it pre-packaged in bulk. under the guise of ‘hygiene’ people ended up eating larger quantities of less healthy food!
but packaging must be useful for something…like sterile medical supplies and protection for delicate goods. so while we can reduce or altogether eliminate the packaging on most food, we cannot yet ship a television across the world without a shock-absorbing box. which is why i appreciate this design, by tom ballhatchet, for a styrofoam box insert that transforms into a TV stand:
