TEJA
PROJECT ROLE: DESIGNER
Teja is a Mexican line of food. For this rebranding project I created packaging for three types of Mexican queso, two types of salsa, taco seasoning, and tortillas.
The goal of this project was to find a type of food; Italian, Chinese, Mexican, and address the packaging issues that this overall type of food presents.
The first issue I addressed with Mexican food packaging was color. When approaching the Mexican food section in the grocery store, almost all packaging is red, green, and yellow. These colors definitely represent Mexican culture and food, but they make all the packaging look the same. The goal was to create packaging that stood out from the rest. The solution I arrived at removes almost all forms of color and presents strong pattern element. Usually color is used to attract attention to a product, but color was overused in this case.
The second issue addressed was materials, first with the jars. Most Mexican queso and salsa jars are either too tall and too narrow, they are a not uniform in shape, and/or they have lids that are not completely flat. This prevents them from being safely stacked. The goal was to use jars that were stackable so that space could be saved during storage. The jars also needed to be a durable plastic instead of glass so they would better withstand wear and accidental dropping. The final jars that were chosen are uniform in width throughout the set and provide flat lids. They are easily stackable up to three high. The jars are also not glass, so when dropped they do not shatter.
Continuing with materials, another goal was to discontinue the use of plastic for the taco seasoning and tortilla packaging in preference for a more sustainable material. A thicker, recyclable, paper was used.
The choice of paper for the taco seasoning packaging also allowed me to address the third issue, specifically pertaining to previous taco seasoning packaging. In the past, seasoning containers were not resealable and did not sit up by themselves. These issues were solved by creating packaging that stands up by itself and easily reseals.
The new packaging design is more user friendly and stands out from competitive products on a shelf.
