<strong>Stark, unattractive value-tier packaging design is losing favor with customers.</strong>
One-third of consumers consciously seek out private label products to save money, states Chicago-based IRI in its January 2015 report "Private Label &amp; National Brands: Dialing in on Core Shoppers." More than five years after the official end of the Great Recession, consumers continue to search for affordable grocery options, and nearly half (46 percent) of consumers say they are planning to purchase affordable brands more frequently in the coming year. For this reason, many retailers have started to give their opening-price-point private brands greater attention.

Todd Maute, a partner with New York-based CBX, agrees that there has been a "recent resurgence" in value-tier products.

"They are being treated more strategically than they have been in the past," he says, especially when it comes to their packaging design. Typically, standard value-tier packaging was "basic" and "cheap" looking because retailers wanted to convey to consumers that the product was inexpensive. However, recent private brand packaging redesigns and opening-price-point brand introductions indicate that retailers are changing the way they present their value tier to consumers.