Co-design with parents and designers: developing packaging concepts for children

Abstract

ABSTRACT Co-design enables relevant stakeholders to participate in the design process and has been employed to examine social issues. Although most previous studies have identified the benefits and characteristics of collaborative work with specific case studies, there is a dearth of research on the topic of how co-design can influence children’s snacking behaviour. Therefore, the aim of this study is to explore how co-design that involves parents and designers can be beneficial in the context of children’s unhealthy snack products. The primary data collection method involved a co-design workshop, followed by semi-structured interviews two months later. The findings show that one of the benefits of co-design is educating consumers on snack packaging that designers create to persuade them to buy unhealthy products. This study also suggests four packaging design strategies (information, affordance, fun and storytelling) that guide designers on how to make snack packaging for children. Furthermore, co-design with parents and designers has two characteristics: active consumer engagement and positive emotion creation. This study contributes to the co-design literature by providing insights into the benefits of collaboration between parents and designers and determining the attributes for healthy packaging for children.