Package Deal

In Consumed: OpenX: How to solve a problem that consumers hate? With a product, of course.

Nobody likes those incredibly hard-to-open, clear plastic packages that hang from retail pegboards, trapping your new purchase inside, clearly visible but seemingly unattainable without a long struggle, a sharp implement and possibly an injury. Nevertheless, this packaging method is pervasive and shows no sign of disappearing soon. Here’s a case, then, in which the marketplace simply ignores consumers.

Actually, that’s not true. The marketplace is not ignoring consumers at all. In fact, in a recent roundup of the worst packaging, Consumer Reports noted that “a cottage industry has developed among manufacturers looking to cash in on packaging angst.” One prominent example: OpenX, a $5 device designed specifically to help people cope with seemingly impregnable plastic casings….

Continue reading here. (Problems with the NYT Magazine’s RSS feed continue, so that’s actually a link to the Boston Globe, which also publishes Consumed.)