The effect of packaging on the sales of fresh milk in Cyprus

The fresh milk sold in Cyprus comes from organized cattle farms, is collected, is transported to the processing plants in refrigerated stainless steel tanks and owing to the small distances, the milk is transported to the processing plants in maximum 2-3 hours. The processing plants in Cyprus are all HACCP certified and use similar pasteurizing methods. The above mean that the fresh milk sold by the four processors is of the same quality and due to regulations of the Ministry and of Commerce and Industry, the milk is sold at the same prices. The fresh milk companies can only increase their market share by adding some innovation in their product offering. The innovation which is used relates to the packaging of fresh milk which was made possible after the companies stopped selling fresh milk in glass bottles and adopted plastic bottles and the paper tetra-pack package. From the literature reviewed carried out in the context of this project, revealed how fresh milk marketers can use the packaging to gain competitive advantage. Some of the successful packaging ideas involved such parameters as size, shape, colours, wordings and other features. In order to discover what features to include in the design of the fresh milk packaging, qualitative and quantitative research was undertaken. Three specially selected focus groups discussed possible ways and arrived to definite suggestions which are given in chapters 4 and 5 of this project report. The quantitative research carried out amongst 800 fresh milk users was a telephone survey which had the objective to find out in what ways the packaging affects the sales of fresh milk and what design changes must be made which are originated from the consumers and not from the professional designers. Owing to the large size of the representative sample who took part in the telephone survey, the conclusions reached have a very high degree of validity.