Zinin

Zinin – 3rd year Bachelor 2018

Aim: Reduce the amount of packaging waste in the Netherlands
Theme: Design for human needs
Client: Cube Design Museum and Provincie Limburg

In order to reduce the amount of packaging waste in the Netherlands we designed a company that makes the zero waste lifestyle assessable for everyone.

The project topic I worked on during my internship in the Cube labs is ‘Smart Packaging’. We got the assignment to design for human needs. We translated this in identifying the largest problems in the world of food packaging with an eye on the current developments and food trends. This to also recognize future problems.
After doing research into the topic ‘food packaging’ we learned that one of the major problems is that fact that for many people packaging still equals garbage. “Milieu centraal” (n.d.) writes that a Dutch individual opens on average of 7 packages a day. This creates a lot of waste: 20 percent of our waste consists of packaging.
This became the goal of our design project: Reduce the amount of packaging waste.
With this goal in mind we conducted interviews with professionals in the packaging chain and supermarket customers. One returning aspect of these interviews stayed with us in particular, namely the growing trend of online grocery shopping. Once all the selling happens online, we predict a radical shift in the world of packaging design. Emphasis will come to lay on factors like improving the shelf life of a product instead of visual stimuli to convince the customer to buy.
On this notion we designed the company Zinin that let’s its users make use of Smart Shelfs, a system that works together with reusable Foodboxes. In this future world food is no longer packaged in portions but kept in large bulk containers. Once a customer places an order, a generic box is filled in the distribution center with the exact amount the customer ordered. This box is delivered at home. The costumer can put the box on the smart shelf. The shelf will recognize the box and show the user information about the product (expiration date, weight). Next to that the shelf cools the box to the specific temperature that is recommended for preserving that specific type of food. Preserving a food product at the right temperature can gain days on its expiration date.
Empty boxes will be collected by Zinin during a new delivery or can be brought back to the pick-up point and re-used.

Have a look at the report below for further information about the stakeholders involved in this project, the research that has been done, our design process, and our end result.

Report:

intership-report-kyara-fasen Download