Wrapped Up – A Highly Innovative Packaging Concept From Sandoz

With the launch and re-branding of former Novartis Generics to Sandoz, the company has taken the opportunity to revamp its packaging, and has come up with a unique concept that has many advantages for customers.

The basis of the new packaging concept is a color-coded system making use of the registered Novartis trademarks - the triangle and the 'S' of Sandoz. By allocating a specific color for the triangle to represent the active pharmaceutical ingredient and a specific color for the 'S' of Sandoz to represent the strength of dosage, an individual color combination for each product is created. These color combinations are selected and allocated centrally, thus ensuring uniformity and consistency of the Sandoz global portfolio wherever it is marketed.

The color-coded system is backed up by detailed product information, displayed in easily accessible and easily readable layouts. The result is a strong new brand image.

Market research in pharmacies and hospitals, and with patients in countries where color-coded systems are not yet used, has shown very positive results.

The obvious advantages of this new packaging concept include the fact that wholesalers, pharmacists, medical staff and patients can recognize and distinguish between products at a glance. Pharmacists in particular appreciate that information is visible on three sides of the package, permitting quick reading and access, no matter how the package is stored.

There are clear benefits too for the patient. For example, if more than one family member is taking a Sandoz product, it easy for them to differentiate between product by color code, rather than having to remember difficult product names. The same is true for the traveler who needs to be able to recognize his/her medication in a foreign country, and can do so by identifying the correct color-coded design.

Finally, at a time when world-wide illiteracy rates are increasing - UNESCO estimates that nearly one in seven of the world's six billion people cannot read or write - the virtue of a color-coded packaging system is clear.