Packaging Design
by OneZeroEight
Sept 30, 2026
6 Mins Read
For decades, FMCG packaging had a familiar job. Get noticed on the shelf. Be recognised from a few feet away. Explain enough when someone picks it up. Look unmistakably like the brand.
That job hasn’t disappeared.
But now the same pack may first meet a shopper as a tiny rectangle on Blinkit, Zepto or Swiggy Instamart, surrounded by prices, discounts, ratings, sponsored products and competing SKUs.
That changes the brief.
India’s quick-commerce market is projected to reach $50 billion by 2030, according to Google and Deloitte. Its shopper base could double to 70 million, while non-food categories such as beauty, fashion and electronics are expected to account for 45% of quick-commerce spend.
For FMCG leaders, quick commerce packaging is no longer a side conversation about e-commerce execution. It is becoming a brand-design question.
Physical retail gives packaging space. A shopper sees bottles as bottles, boxes as boxes. Size, shape, shelf position and neighbouring products all help the eye make sense of what’s there.
A quick-commerce grid strips much of that context away.
Every pack is compressed into a product tile. A 200 ml bottle and a one-litre bottle can appear almost identical in size. Fine typography disappears. Secondary claims become visual dust.
And this is happening in a channel that is getting harder for FMCG companies to dismiss. NIQ reports that 82% of India's surveyed online shopper population uses quick commerce, while the channel grew 68% year on year in Q4 2025. Beauty and Home Care are also moving deeper into the channel, with average order values rising 40% and 54% respectively.
The digital shelf isn't replacing the physical one. It is adding another viewing condition that packaging has to survive.
Packaging can no longer be evaluated only at shelf distance. It also has to survive thumbnail distance.
Here’s the interesting bit. The problem isn't simply that packs become smaller. It’s that their visual hierarchy changes.
Research published in the Journal of Business Research analysed 158 consumer products and found that brand-related elements tended to be more visually conspicuous through their salience, size and position on the pack.
That matters because the details that looked perfectly clear on the designer’s 27-inch monitor may barely exist on a phone.
Distinctive assets become especially useful here. Colour. Pack shape. A character. A graphic device. A familiar block of typography.
Ipsos’ database now covers more than 12,000 brand assets across 900+ brands, yet only 15% qualify as highly distinctive assets that immediately and uniquely cue the right brand. Brands with stronger asset portfolios were 31% more likely to be considered and 38% more likely to be used in Ipsos’ analysis.
So the question for a pack isn’t only, “Can people read the brand name?”
It is also, “Would they know it was us before they finished reading?”
Quick commerce creates another problem that’s easy to miss.
Put six variants from the same range next to each other on a supermarket shelf and physical scale helps. The shopper can move closer, pick one up and compare.
Now shrink those six packs into a mobile grid.
Does the 200 ml variant look different from the 500 ml one? Can someone separate shampoo from conditioner? Original from low sugar? Lemon from lime?
This problem is well established enough that GS1 has formal Mobile Ready Hero Image guidelines. They organise product identification around four questions: Who is the brand? What is the product? Which variant is it? How much is there?
GS1 also makes an important point: a conventional pack shot may not communicate these clearly once reduced for a small screen.
That doesn’t mean adding bigger and bigger labels until the pack starts shouting. It means hierarchy matters more.
This isn't only design theory.
Researchers at the University of Cambridge worked with Unilever on “mobile ready hero images”, digital product representations designed to make essential information easier to identify on small screens.
In an eight-week retailer A/B test, mobile-ready imagery for Magnum produced a 24% increase in online sales compared with conventional imagery.
That number needs context. It was one brand test, not a universal promise that simplifying every pack will produce a 24% lift.
But the broader lesson is useful: how a pack translates to a small digital environment can affect commercial performance.
And there’s a crucial distinction here.
A mobile-ready hero image is not necessarily the physical pack redesigned for e-commerce. GS1 defines it as a digital representation that may differ from a standard pack shot while retaining the physical pack’s key colour, shape and design cues.
That distinction saves us from the wrong conclusion.
A ketchup bottle still has to work in a supermarket. A shampoo pack still has to communicate in someone’s bathroom. Packaging still carries claims, instructions, regulatory information and sensory cues that a 90-pixel product tile cannot.
So “thumbnail-first packaging” is too simplistic.
KPMG’s 2026 work on India’s consumer market makes the broader point: physical retail, e-commerce, quick commerce and D2C increasingly operate as an overlapping system, not isolated channels.
Packaging therefore needs resilience, not allegiance to one channel.
At OneZeroEight, a useful way to think about this is through three viewing distances:
Shelf distance: Can I spot and recognise it?
Hand distance: Can I understand and evaluate it?
Thumbnail distance: Can I identify the brand, product and variant when everything gets compressed?
A strong packaging system should survive all three.
The bigger shift isn't ten-minute delivery itself. It is what happens when product discovery, comparison and purchase get compressed onto a small screen.
Packaging now has to work before it is held.
That puts more pressure on distinctive assets, cleaner hierarchy and disciplined SKU architecture. It also makes digital product imagery part of brand management, not merely an e-commerce production task.
The pack still has to look good up close.
But increasingly, it also has to make sense when it’s barely bigger than your thumb.
How is quick commerce changing FMCG packaging design?
Quick commerce compresses packaging into small mobile product tiles. This increases the importance of fast brand recognition, clear product and variant identification, distinctive brand assets and disciplined visual hierarchy.
What is a mobile-ready hero image?
A mobile-ready hero image is an adapted digital representation of a product designed for small-screen shopping. GS1 recommends preserving recognisable physical-pack cues while making information such as brand, product type, variant and quantity easier to identify.
Should FMCG brands redesign physical packaging specifically for quick commerce?
Not necessarily. Physical packaging still has jobs across retail shelves, in-hand evaluation and product use. Brands should first test whether better digital imagery can solve the problem before changing the physical pack itself.
What should FMCG brands test on quick-commerce apps?
The key test is whether shoppers can quickly identify the brand, product type, variant and pack size at thumbnail scale. Brands should also examine how easily neighbouring SKUs can be distinguished from one another.
Why are distinctive brand assets important in quick commerce?
Distinctive assets such as colour, shape, typography, characters and graphic devices can help shoppers recognise a brand even when detailed pack information becomes difficult to read. In crowded digital grids, that recognition can become an important shortcut.
Share
