This paper replies to the call for more agile-stage-gate hybrid methods in the context of physical innovations. By showing how some of the characteristics of conventional linear stage-gate methods and of the agile approaches can be integrated, we propose and test a new form of hybrid method for the physical new product development process (NPD). Distinguishing itself from the conventional NPD methods and practices, biased towards alignments between companies and consumers as the key to market success, our method focuses on the innovation potential intrinsic to misalignments. Through a qualitative research applied in an existing European consortium of innovators, the present work guides companies in the systematic identification and exploration of misalignments between their designers and users. By identifying misalignments at specific level of the NPD process, our method provides companies with a deep analytical insight into how, where and why (mis)alignments between their designers’ decisions and users’ demands might occur. Our method revealed to be a strategic learning and reflection tool to support companies in the proactive management of the identified misalignments, as informative, beneficial and inspirational aspects of the NPD process. @en

Sustainable food packaging alternatives represent an ever-expanding trend on supermarkets' shelves. Despite the technological efforts, a higher sustainability level often comes at the expense of other (perceived) benefits which consumers might not want to sacrifice. While the balance between the benefits and drawbacks of “cleaner” packaging production is central to the designers’ perspective, it is generally overlooked in consumer research. This paper investigates how European consumers cope with product-packaging decisions, when these involve a compromise. Through an online survey with 5035 consumers in five different European countries, our results show that the sustainability appreciation can spill-over to other conventional benefits, such convenience, aesthetic quality or the perceived ability of the packaging to preserve the content. By contributing to sustainability literature and, in particular, to the understanding of the halo and spill-over effect of sustainability, this study shows that positive associations triggered by eco-design elements (e.g., a biodegradable and compostable material) absorb and filter out negative experiences, preventing consumers from perceiving certain drawbacks. This research also provides valuable practical implications to marketers and product designers, by demonstrating how different product categories, packaging types and consumer characteristics, in terms of gender, age, nationality, values and lifestyle, influence product-packaging decisions and their inherent trade-offs.@en

Sustainable packaging innovations are becoming increasingly available in the marketplace. However, their communication to consumers remains a challenging task, as neither their distinctiveness nor their higher sustainability level is recognized. Contributing to research in environmental psychology, the current work conceptualized and tested the new concept of Meaningful Reminder as a strategy to communicate such distinctiveness and higher sustainability. To understand how a meaningful reminder can be created and used, this research investigated how eco explicit (logos, labels and statements) and implicit packaging design cues (auditory, tactile and visual elements) combine and interact and how such a combination can be used to the advantage of sustainability, to increase sustainability salience, perception and sustainable disposal behavior of the packaging and its content. Across three lab studies and different measures (lexical decision task, thought listing task, self-reported scales and observations of consumers’ disposal behavior), we identify the conditions under which combining explicit and implicit cues can be counterproductive, not leading to any increase or even a decrease in sustainability salience and perception. However, under different conditions, we show how sustainability salience, perception of packaging sustainability and even consumer sustainable disposal behaviour can be positively affected.

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