PACKLAB. » First & second prize at the Easy To Open Competition

Easy to Open invention competition, jointly organised by the Finnish Rheumatism Association and the Foundation for Finnish Inventions, culminated in the award ceremony on 31 March 2009. The prizes were awarded in connection with Tekes’ annual Futupack seminar in Espoo, Finland.

The aim of the competition was to find new easy-to-open package inventions for consumer goods and medicines. A total of 132 competition entries were submitted and eight packages already on the market or being designed participated in the honorary mention category for companies.

The invention competition was a part of the Finnish Rheumatism Association’s ETU – Easy to Use Packaging project. The aim of the project is to provide citizens with increasingly easy-to-open packages. The aim is to influence retail, packaging industry and designers in particular. The ETU project receives funding from RAY, the Finland´s Slot Machine Association.

High quality entries

Numerous inventors and design students participated in the competition. The jury considered the level of entries high. In choosing the winning entries, the jury emphasised the novelty value of the inventions. In addition to financial awards, the winners will receive considerable support from the Foundation for Finnish Inventions for the protection of industrial property rights of the inventions, their further development and their commercialisation (approximately valued at EUR 6,500 for each invention).

easy-to-open-2008

Winners and grounds for the jury’s decision :

1st prize (3000 EUR): Iisi
Ilari Laitinen & Nikolo Kerimov – PACKLAB, Lahti Institute of Design

Iisi is an extremely simple and functional package. Opening is easy and the place where the package should be opened is clearly marked. After opening, Iisi can also be easily closed. Iisi commendably utilises the flexibility of carton. Iisi’s triangular shape decreases the need to use force when handling the package and simultaneously forms a spout at the front edge of the package. Iisi is well suited for, for example, flour, flakes, bran and rice.

2nd prize (2000 EUR): Flopda

Per-Oskar Joenpelto & Lauri Lindqvist – PACKLAB, Lahti Institute of Design

flopda

Flopda is a versatile and easy to open package. Flopda ingeniously produces two functions with a flexible material: sealing and closing force. However, large opening surfaces enable opening and closing the package using little force. Flopda’s strength lies particularly in its re-closeability. Flopda is suitable for a variety of products, such as food spreads, take away foods, cheeses, jams, ice cream and frozen goods.

It possible to make packages easier to open

“Our packaging projects have received a great deal of publicity. Everyone has agreed that many packages are difficult to open. Companies, designers and design students have embraced the opportunity to participate in developing packages that are easier to open. This competition demonstrates that we are going in the right direction. We have a good basis for the future,” says Tita Ström, the chair of the jury and Health Manager of the Finnish Rheumatism Association.

“From the point of view of the Foundation for Finnish Inventions, the competition once again proved that problems perceived around us, in this case packages that are difficult to open, can be solved by tackling them actively. All the awarded inventions share the fact that they have been ambitiously thought out and designed by competent individuals,” says Kusti Alasalmi, project manager at the Foundation for Finnish Inventions.

“A package that is easy to open is the right of each and every consumer. This can be achieved by boldly combining various perspectives in package design: design, utilisation of consumer data and, for example, materials and nanotechnology. The aim of Tekes’ Futupack network is to consolidate the formation of this comprehensive perspective in companies. The Easy to Open competition makes the significance of well-functioning package as a strategic competitive edge concrete to companies,” says Anna Alasmaa, senior technology adviser from Tekes.

“Designing a functional package is a demanding task, one that requires profound study of various details and overall optimisation. The competition was topical because the preparation of a European standard of testing how easy packages are to open is in the process of being drawn up,” says Terhen Järvi-Kääriäinen, research manager from the Association of Packaging Technology and Research. She is taking part in the preparation of the standard in an expert role.

Competition organisers:

The Finnish Rheumatism Association and the Foundation for Finnish Inventions, and the Finnish Food and Drink Industries’ Federation, the Pharma Industry Finland, the Association of Packaging Technology and Research, the Finnish Grocery Trade Association, the Finnish Design for All network, the Finnish Packaging Association, Tekes´ Futupack network, the Finnish Association of Designers Ornamo and VTT.
For more information (in Finnish, photos of prize-winning packages):

[link] http://www.helppopakkausonetu.com/