How Printed Electronics is Changing Consumer Goods

Transforming the human interface—staggeringly better brand enhancement
Probably one of the hottest topics this year is how, after 1,000 years of static print, the human interface is now starting to use many of our senses instead of one. Never forget that one in three Americans has difficulty reading instructions because they are sight-impaired, illiterate, dyslexic etc. and print is being made ever smaller to get everything in—a bizarre failure for a nation that got to the moon nearly forty years ago. For example, e-labels and e-packaging will employ electronic texture change, controlled aroma emission, localized sound and recording and many interactive features. This is therefore about transforming brands, not just saving lives when up to 25 percent of medication accidents are down to failure to comprehend written instructions and from lack of prompts from the package. Avery Dennison gives a case study of printed electronics in consumer goods. A key to this is for brand managers and brand facing suppliers to employ creative design using this new kit of parts instead of languishing in the wrong century.