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How Face Reality Solved its Over-packaging Problem at Scale: Packaging World · Through the Line: Packaging and Processing

• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Through the Line, the podcast exploring innovations and information across the packaging and processing landscape.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: From topics impacting consumer packaged goods and healthcare packaging to the latest technologies in food processing operations.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_03: Welcome to this edition of the Through the Line podcast.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_03: I'm Matt Reynolds, Chief Editor at Packaging World.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_03: Today we're looking at what happens to a package after the brand owner is done designing it, how a fast-growing professional skincare brand and its supply chain partner rebuilt the way orders get protected and shipped.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_03: I'm joined by Kate Kohler, she's Chief Operations and Technology Officer at Face Reality, and Fiona Lowbridge, she's chief commercial officer at ALM, who have been working together for about six years now, and today are navigating all new challenges with supply chains, sustainability legislation, and a whole lot more.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_03: So let's start with some introductions.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_02: My name is Kate Kohler.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_02: I'm the Chief Operations and Technology Officer here at Face Reality.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_02: And I think of operations technology as really being two sides of the exact same job.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_02: It's really about building that infrastructure behind the growth.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_02: And our brand has had some pretty tremendous growth in the 20, almost 21 years that we've been in business.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_02: And so I have the pleasure of overseeing the supply chain and the technology side of it.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_03: And Fiona, why don't you introduce yourself?
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_01: Fiona Lubic, Chief Commercial Officer for Alam.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: We've been in business for 30 years next year, servicing high technology clients that really have a passion for their branch.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_01: And we want to make sure that we protect that for them.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_01: So we've been in business, as I said, 30 years and very happy with the relationship that we have with our face reality clients and also many of our others.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_03: Level said a few things because you've got a huge skew variety.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_03: Or actually, before we even do that, maybe you should describe what it, what the product is itself through the lens of the product.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_03: Maybe you'll be telling us a little bit about the packaging that you need to use from the primary.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_03: I assume a lot of these products are either jars or tubes or spray bottles, these sorts of things.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_03: So maybe tell me about the product and your positioning in the marketplace.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_03: And from that, you can springboard into the type of packaging that necessitates.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_02: For sure.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_02: It sounds like you need to do a research, Matt.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_02: So Face Reality, we're a professional skincare brand, and we're really focused on helping people achieve clear skin for good.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_02: So we are an acne brand through and through.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_02: What makes us unique is that we are truly a professional brand, which means we have a range of products, well over 60 SKUs, that are a mix between products that the end consumer, the person experiencing acne or is concerned about experiencing acne, will use.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_02: And then we also have a large selection of tools for our skincare professionals.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_02: So think aestheticians, dermatologists, plastics, med spas, anywhere where those skincare conversations and experiences are happening.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_02: So then you have larger format back bar products.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_02: You have things like peels, which come in a very specific dark glass jar, which, as you can imagine, presents quite a few challenges on making sure it gets there safely.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_02: So we have, from a packaging perspective, we have a very wide range of products going from tubes to bottles.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_02: Actually, we just introduced earlier this month our first OmniMist Clear Spray.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_02: So that's a whole new foray for us.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_02: But I think of packaging not just as primary or secondary, but also on the shipment side of the house.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_02: We are a B2B brand.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_02: So thank large orders for our professionals, stocking their shelves, stocking their treatment rooms.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_02: But we also support our professionals in something we call dropship, which is more of a direct-to-consumer model where they can actually place orders and have them shipped directly to their customer or their client.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_02: And then we take on all of kind of the operational challenges of that.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_02: So we have a very wide range of orders that vary from one to two items to orders that literally need to get palletized.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_02: And it's a pretty wide range.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_02: And so again, finding that right fit for someone who can evolve with us and support those two fairly different feeling parts of our business was also really important.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, understood.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_03: So is there a way that you think of differentiating between what your spec is for your primary package versus the or you or your contract manufacturer, or maybe you dictate that to them and then they run with it versus where the handoff, probably a little bit further upstream, where pickers essentially or people who are doing kidding, that type type of thing, have to make decisions on their own.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_03: And I would think that would be the contract manufacturer or alum on their side of things.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_03: How does that that trio work and who's responsible for that?
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_02: I would say we we as a brand stay very close to it.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_02: So from packaging design, and we did a full package, like a full-line redesign about three years ago.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_02: And something I'm really proud of the teams involved in making that happen.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_02: So we stay very close to how we package.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_02: We have both O2C and cosmetic products.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_02: So packaging again is like not an afterthought.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_02: It's really part of our product development cycle.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_02: And then we work with kind of the entire process from beginning to end in terms of what makes sense from the product experience to then let's call it the logistics side of the house and to the boxing and unboxing.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_02: And we worked with Elam quite a lot in terms of how do we right size those packages to be to make sure that it's a good customer experience and that there's as little waste as possible.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_02: Because when you're when you're packing small-scale products that are less than an ounce with large format products that may come in a very heavy bottle with packaging glass containers, like that's not an easy thing to fix.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think the natural thing is to over-package and over-protect.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_02: And that becomes really wasteful and quite expensive in the long run.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_02: And so that's kind of one of the areas where we're not perfect, but we're certainly getting better.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_02: And that's something we've really been focusing on.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_03: There's a kind of an industry anecdote or adage that says if you are perfect, if you are 100% and never have a break or a or a leaker, you might be overpackaging by just a little bit.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_03: Because those are natural, they're bound to happen.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_03: They're almost unavoidable in the practical setting.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_03: So if you really are uh at exactly 100%, then maybe you there are places that you could scale back a little bit.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_03: What about specific product or package features?
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_03: You hinted at this, but I'm sure a lot of your products use pumps, droppers, that sort of thing, compared to, let's say, just a screw top or a flip top.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_03: You have to think about those specialty uh pieces as well as likely failure points in transit, right?
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, for sure.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_02: Thankfully, we are dropper-free, at least for now, but we do have a lot of pumps.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_02: We have a lot of airless tubes, we have now our spray bottle, and then we have a line of toners, which is a flip cap, but again, introduces some specific challenges.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_02: And again, I think one of the larger challenges for us is also just the variance of size.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_02: The fact that you might have an eye cream, which is very small, right next to a large format back bar product.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_02: That's a really big challenge.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_02: One thing that we think about is in that how do we keep our price point affordable?
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_02: How do we keep damage to a minimum, and how we just make it a better experience?
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_02: We're very focused on keeping our packaging as tight and streamlined as possible.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_02: So we have very few products that have secondary package, as an example.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_02: Most products will be in a tube or in a bottle, and we're able to work with our product development and our quality teams to make sure that we're fully compliant, but without a whole lot of unnecessary secondary packaging.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_02: I'll hand it over to Fiona, who can definitely speak to a little bit more of the specifics on kind of how the team approached solving some of our overpacking challenges, because that was definitely something that we saw as a big opportunity.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and I'm sorry, Fiona, I should ask, that's sort of the handshake.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_03: If you're not doing the, let's say, a carton with all sorts of protective bracing and around around these bottles and so on.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_03: Rather, you're turning it over to, am I pronouncing this right?
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_03: Alum?
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_03: Alum.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_03: Alum, okay.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_03: To basically be packaging in bulk in a lot of situations with packages, tubes, bottles that are mostly just in primary packaging.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_03: Fiona, why don't you take it away and how you approach the extremely wide variety of SKUs and the need and the specific needs of a B2B slash B2C and everywhere in between type of business.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_01: I think you've described that really.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_01: And Kate too, of course, when you're approaching something like this, obviously with the brand switches face reality, where the brand is so important to them, that we need to make sure that any customer that opens that product that gets that out of box regardless of where they're sitting, we're always looking at how can we achieve that.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_01: And really it's about marrying technology with packaging and with fulfillment.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_01: So altogether, so you're not just leaving it until the end of the line and leaving somebody to figure out what should this go in.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: We're doing that way further up the process where we're doing packaging dimensional information, gathering all of that in advance so that our systems can automatically tell the picker what boxes they should be using to utilize the best box and minimize the amount of packaging and waste that we're putting out there.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_01: And prior to us introducing this new technique, we were putting product into bubble mailers or sorry, bubble rack to protect the jars and the products that Kate just described.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_01: But again, that was meaning that we were shipping larger boxes and sometimes shipping inner cartons, then putting that into the outer carton.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_01: So we looked at that to see how could we make that better.
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_01: So that's where we came in to this whole yummy transition to this.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_01: It's like a craft paper, but it has honeycombed effect on it.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_01: So that you can actually crinkle the paper around the actual product that you're shipping.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_01: And the paper itself is completely curbside recyclable.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_01: So through introducing that, we can really protect the product that's going out.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: And as Kate alluded to, you've got some that might have a small eye cream, some that might have that peel that is a heavier jar.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: So we have to have a solution that's going to keep that separate within the same box, but not chip air, because we don't want to be doing that either.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_01: And actually, what we found, we introduced this was that we could reduce significantly the number of cartons that we were actually shipping.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: And that's also driven by us in advance telling the picker this is the box that you should use.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: The barcode is printed out, it's inserted onto it.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_01: So before the product is even picked and put into the rack and put into the box, all of that is already dictated for the pickers.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_03: Go ahead, Jase.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_02: I was gonna say, I think it also just starts upstream.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_02: So as we work on new product development, we have a pretty strong bias to stay within the types of packaging that we're already leveraging because we have a lot of data on them.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_02: We have a lot of great learnings, we've been optimizing them.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_02: So whenever possible, we would much rather use the same kind of tube or the same kind of bottle that we've already used successfully in the past.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_02: I think from a branding perspective, there's a lot of benefits there from like a visual cohesiveness because our products are lined up on shelves at these med spas and aestheticians' offices.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_02: But there's also, of course, the consideration of how will they actually travel and what will that experience look like?
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_02: And so from the moment we were like, hey, we're gonna start doing the spray as our new product, we started thinking not just from how do we source it correctly and how do we test it correctly, but how do we test it all the way through?
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_02: And so we'll work with our three PL partners on making sure, hey, I'm not investing in something that will fundamentally break your processes, am I?
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_02: So we're having those conversations from inception all the way through our test and then launch periods.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_02: Oh no, I was gonna say I strongly believe that operations should create confidence, not complexity.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_02: And the way that we do that is by making sure that we're kind of thinking of the entire process at every step of the way.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_02: And we do stay very close with all of our partners from sourcing to transportation to picking, because really a failure at any one of those points will result in the customer having a subpar experience.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_02: And so we'd have to think a bit about it that way from their perspective.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_03: Sure.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_03: So that kind of gets us through and it the primary packaging and the variety of skews that are being picked for any individual order.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_03: That these orders have to be almost entirely unique, though, and that they're kitted together.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_03: So I assume like a custom kit is each one is gonna have, I don't know, half a dozen to possibly dozens of different SKUs.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_03: So what does a kit box look like or kit ace or carton, depending on how you describe it?
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_03: How many sizes of those, the secondary packaging now are in rotation that you're using to get these to your customers, whether they're direct to consumer or they're your more medical professional customers?
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_01: Do you want to take that one?
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: So obviously, this is an exercise that we went through recently, hence the reason we're having this conversation today, and that's where we introduced this dimensional packaging process from a technology perspective.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_01: So there was a lot of work that had to be done in the beginning where you're measuring all of the product, taking the cubic dimensions of it.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_01: And then the technology that we have is dictating what size box you should use.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_01: But obviously, it's not dictating multiple boxes.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_01: We don't want to have that many boxes because you're defeating the whole purpose then.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_01: So what the algorithms are doing, it's looking to see what are the average number of units per order, what are the numbers, what are the units that are shipping the most, what is the configuration that is most likely.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_01: And then we have four to six different configurations then that we can use, depending on what products are shipping.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_01: And as I said, the system is making that determination once it knows what the order is and the order size, and that will dictate then before the product even gets out to the picker to go start picking it, they will already know what boxes they're going to use for that.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_03: Okay, start your construction.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_03: Clearly, anything that's either using recycled material or becomes recycled material, it can add cost to, let's say, cost to per shipment.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_03: How does that pencil out against damage claims, replacements, reverse logistics, and even against dim weights and things like that, if you're actually reducing packaging components by using slightly more expensive, let's say, potentially, and that might not even be the case, but slightly more expensive packaging, but it is being more effective at its primary role of getting the products to the consumer or to the medical provider intact.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I think you hit the nail on the head.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_02: It's really a combination of those things, right?
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_02: So we work really closely with Fiona and her team on looking at the whole picture of how much went into the order itself, not into any one component of it, right?
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_02: Because when I think more globally, like sustainability improvements are most meaningful when they work both operationally and financially.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_02: If you do one at the expense of the other, you're probably creating another problem instead of solving for both.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_02: And so when they do both of those, then we can truly scale.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_02: And so this was an example where we were able to get enough efficiency throughout the entire order packing process and by right-sizing the rest of the materials that this really became a win-win for I think everyone involved.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_02: And Fiona, you can certainly speak to the details of that.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_03: Good.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_03: Now, just a point of clarification is the let's say the kit box or the kit case, is that branded for face reality or is it unbranded like craft stock?
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_03: And is I guess the unboxing experience because you're going to a B2B professional customer, is that less important than, let's say, I don't know, a consumer-driven unboxing experience, for lack of a better word?
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I can take that one.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_02: We are very choiceful where we invest in those experiences.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_02: And so we have a combination.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_02: So we have, for example, our welcome box, which is truly a very branded outside, inside, on like designed for the unboxing experience, which is something you get when you first sign up with us as a professional partner.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_02: That's an area where there is probably a little bit of waste, but it's one where we intentionally wanted that unboxing welcome experience.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_02: And then for our replenishment orders, so really for the bulk of our orders, it's again kind of a combination of how do you leverage scale and the sourcing that Alum can help us provide while still branding to a reasonable degree?
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_02: And so we actually do a combination.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_02: So it's an unbranded box with branded tape, which really creates a little bit of that personalized experience to our brand without slapping our logo on every side.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_03: You probably deal with a lot of different brand owners.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_03: Kate is your valued customer, but one of a few, I'm sure.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_03: So what are some common primary or even secondary packaging?
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_03: I know not a lot of secondary packaging that Kate's doing in this case, but what are some primary packaging decisions that you see brands make that you think had you been involved sooner, you could have avoided some of these downstream costs or streamlined?
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_03: Is there any advice you would give to all of my brand owners, CPG readers?
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_01: The thing is, I think everybody wants to give their customer an Apple out-of-box experience, right?
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: With that beautiful, nice, soft feel and the delight when you open it up.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_01: And it's challenging for brands, especially startups as they're getting going, to figure out how they can give that level of out-of-box experience to their customers when they don't have the volumes associated with that.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_01: So that's how we can really help them because there's lots of different ways to achieve that type of experience, whether it's coating on paper or different prints that you can use.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_01: We can also help our customers thinking of different ways to how we can create a more sort of standardized packaging that doesn't say specifically what's inside it, but then we overlabel what's inside it afterwards so they could spend a little bit more money on really getting that experience at a higher volume.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_01: Then also, as I mentioned, the manufacturability.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_01: If you need to be all fingers and thumbs to close up a box and get the inserts in, and it doesn't always fit exactly in, that's going to take time.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_01: So it's going to drive costs into your supply chain.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_01: That's where we come in earlier, and we'll do time trials on it and we'd say, hey, did you think about making this a crash lock instead of a tuck box, for example, or something along those lines where we can get a product developed and built into its final stage as quickly as possible in the most efficient way possible on the lines.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: So it's all about, as I said, it's the area engagement.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_01: We keep saying to our clients, just get us involved early on.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_01: We don't mind if it's just our guy sitting in a room with your marketing and design teams.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_01: We're happy to have our people out there helping you out with that.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_01: Even if the product is not going to come to us for sourcing, because we manage all of that sourcing, we have our own printers that we use.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_01: But if you want to source it yourself, that's fine.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_01: We're still happy to be involved in it and help you on the manufacturing side of things.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_03: And then sort of a similar question, but from the brand owner point of view, Kate, you've gone through the new brand scaling and hyperscaling, you might even say.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_03: What decisions were you making early on that you look back, if any, and say, we could have gone in a different direction or we could have saved ourselves some heartache and headache?
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_03: Or even when you're you start to shop around for distribution partners and packaging partners, what advice would you have for a brand owner like yourself, only let's say 15 years prior, as you were getting your feet wet?
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_03: Now that you're fully in the water for scaling brands, what packaging advice would you have for them and starting to work with partners like Alum?
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I would just say focus on connecting your needs today with not just your current volume, but thinking ahead as to the company that you're working towards becoming.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_02: I think that when I joined, we were at a very different scale, but we were also thinking about kind of our priorities a little bit differently and thinking ahead to the scale at which we're going to need to operate, but also the kind of experience and the kind of brand story that you're going to be telling.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_02: Sometimes it makes a lot of sense to invest up front to make sure that you're not reworking your packaging and rebranding every other year.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_02: In the professional space, consistency really matters.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_02: We've built a really great trusted relationship with our skincare professionals.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_02: And how do we continue showing up as really they become more successful and more sophisticated as business owners?
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_02: How are we there with them along the way?
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_02: And our products and our packages and how our orders show up really matters in that experience.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_02: I really don't think of supply chain as like a solely behind-the-scenes consideration.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_02: Like it's really core to our customer experience and to our company's ability to grow and scale.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_02: So I would just say solve today's problems, but keep an eye on who you're growing into so that doesn't catch you off guard.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_03: Thanks to Kate from Face Reality and also to Fiona with Elm.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_03: And we appreciate your time today.
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_03: I look forward to seeing more in print in Packaging World magazine and also on the airwaves with Through the Line podcast.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_03: So thanks to you both.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_01: Always a pleasure.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks so much, Matt.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: Great talking to you.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: And thanks for everything, Case.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening to Through the Line Packaging and Processing.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: You can listen to more episodes on all streaming platforms.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: Be sure to visit us at packworld.com, profoodworld.com, and healthcarepackaging.com for more packaging and processing news.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_00: This podcast was edited by Breakens.