Don’t accidentally put this on your pumpkin pie . . . “The Wall Street Journal” just did a big article on a trendy marketing ploy called “chaos packaging.” It’s when companies sell products in containers they wouldn’t normally go in, like sunblock in a whipped cream can. (???)
A brand called Vacation sells a sunblock called Classic Whip that looks just like a can of Reddi-wip. It comes out of the nozzle looking like whipped cream, but it’s SPF 30.
Other examples include a brand called Flo that sells tampons in ice cream tubs, a liquor brand called Engine that sells gin in motor oil cans, and the brand Liquid Death that sells water in “tall boy” cans that used to just be for beer.
It’s become a trendy thing for startups, because it helps their products stand out. But it can also be confusing.
Last year, a cleaning product brand called Puracy started selling soap refills in soda cans. But they had to change them when parents said their kids might think it was soda and drink it.
One of Flo’s founders also said they’ve heard of people accidentally putting their tampons in the fridge, thinking it was ice cream. (I bet a husband did that.)
The idea does seem to work with a lot of these products though. The whipped-cream-sunblock folks say they get around five million views on TikTok every week. And Liquid Death was recently valued at $1.4 BILLION.
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(WSJ)
