Galleries Enhance Image With
Creative and Thoughtful Packaging
Gallery staffs around the country stage one-of-a-kind performances every day.
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oday’s consumers want more from retailers,” states Gary Swerling, president of Packaging Specialties (www.pack-spec.com), a major supplier of gift-wrapping material. “They want to be catered to; they want service.” Decorative packaging helps meet those demands.
Whether with newer products, such as frosted bags, sheer, soft ribbons, and metallic labels in sage, gold, blue or copper, packaging mainstays of white boxes and colored tissue paper, or decorations of their own making, galleries choose materials that enhance their image and set them apart from their competition. They use the products with flair.
“Packaging is like a performance,” says John Crutchfield of Artemis Gallery in Richmond, Va. “It adds color, dimension and excitement to the shopping experience.”Gallery staffs around the country stage one-of-a-kind performances every day with elaborate bows, fancy ribbons, bright ribbonettes, hand-made paper and eye-catching bags. Each package is created as much to identify the gallery as to make a statement about the contents, and to provide an extra service to customers.
Mariposa Gallery in Albu-querque places a simple, silver label on white boxes, then adorns the boxes with original bows made out of dried eucalyptus leaves, silver foil, various colored ribbons and fake flowers. Each of their shopping bags sports a butterfly image, and a butterfly appears in the middle of the letter ‘o’ in Mariposa on their labels. “We’ve gotten more elaborate over the years because our staff has such a good time making the bows and decorating the boxes. We make a big deal out of our packaging,” owner Fay Abrams admits. “It reflects our image that what’s in the box is different from anything else you’d buy and it is extremely creative and unusual.”
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The staff at The Collector in Merritt, N.Y., wraps with abandon, covering white boxes with loops of ribbons and bows often topped with Mylar of multiple colors. “Even a $14 bookmark would have lots of ribbons,” says owner Ronni Kamen. “Sometimes we’ll match the ribbons to the colors of the item purchased. Items that can’t be boxed, like Yardbirds, are wrapped in colorful cellophane. People shop here rather than a department store because of our service. Part of that service is the packaging.”
With a separate room to accommodate hundreds of bows, ribbons, tape, boxes and paper, including colored, hand-marbled and European prints, Artemis prides itself in its unique packaging, much of which is from NY Central (www.nycentral.com), which offers papers in hundreds of colors and patterns. “Our customers love the attention to detail we give to their packages, and the staff loves to decorate the boxes,” comments Crutchfield. Popular among customers are gift bags hand painted by an Artemis staff member that may be purchased.
Simple packaging can also make a statement. Seldom Seen Gallery in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., decorates its boxes by laying three lengths of ribbon across the box at an angle. “This ensures the ribbons lay flat and don’t get messed up in the bag,” explains owner Don Gorenberg. Their brightly colored shopping bags are decorated with stars and include the gallery’s name, address and tag line. “People identify our wrapping with the gallery because it’s remained the same for 15 years, but the packaging doesn’t reflect the gallery as much as the bag — garish and loud, like us,” admits Gorenberg.
Chiascuro Gallery’s wrapping has also withstood the test of time and trends. Since 1987, when the gallery opened, the packaging has been black, red and white tissue paper in a white box tied with black and red raffia. For items that don’t fit in a gift box, two-sided paper — black and white checks, and polka dots — camouflage a corrugated box. Their logo adorns black shopping bags. Owner Peggy Wolf admits the color combination does not reflect the colorfulness of the items in the Chicago gallery. But, she says, “I spent several years in advertising, and know that you shouldn’t change something that works.”
For 20 years, Moonstones Gallery in Cambria, Calif., has focused on three things for their customers: appropriate sizing/ease of use/strength of packaging; making the packaging specific to diverse needs and appropriate for general usage while keeping sizes, shapes and materials to a minimum; and representing their image and that of their artists in the packaging.
“It’s important that the item leave the gallery at a cost that ensures the artist good sales numbers, advertises the gallery after the sale and makes a pleasing statement to the customer who takes the package home,” says Moonstones’ display coordinator Teela Depond. “Over the years, we’ve changed our logo a few times to reflect changes in our gallery and artist selection, but have continued our commitment to low-cost, attractive and classic packaging choices.”
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Their current packaging, says Depond, is just about perfect for them, their artists and customers. They place their gold label on white or teal boxes and use brightly colored tissue paper. Bags carry their trademark colors of teal, white, silver and gold. Curling ribbons in those same colors are placed free of charge on gift items, and ribbonettes of bright colors to suit the seasons are added. “Because many of our customers are tourists, we’ve incorporated bubble-wrap and flo-pak in the packaging to ease their transportation concerns,” explains Depond. “We use recycled packaging materials as often as possible and include a note with the material informing the customer of our commitment to recycling.”
To address the needs of galleries for quality boxes at a reasonable price, Packaging Specialties offers folding gift boxes that have the look of rigid boxes but cost less and take up less space.
Earth tones, says Swerling, continue to be popular in packaging. Clarksville Pottery and Galleries in Austin puts their copper foil-stamped logo on Kraft-colored bags and small boxes. “We always use brightly-colored tissue to accent the colorful nature of the piece or to bring attention to it,” says owner Tom Quilter. An option offered to customers is hand-painted paper created by Austin artist Debra Flanagan. “It’s become a signature look for Clarksville and is recognized by people in the community. The covered boxes are little art forms,” he adds. “Customers love the look, and no one can copy it. Everyone walks out with a smile.”
An image can be created without ribbons and fancy decorating. New Hampshire League of Craftsmen’s choice of packaging is Kraft or white boxes with their dark green logo, and for the holidays — dark green boxes with a silver logo. “We like the dark green with tan because it represents New Hampshire’s rural environment,” says Sally Shiplite, owner of the North Conway gallery.Loretta Radeschi is a Pennsylvania-based free-lance writer.