AI is changing how design teams work. It is useful for some tasks and unhelpful for others. Knowing the difference is part of the craft.
Where AI helps
Used well, AI speeds up the parts of the process that benefit from volume and iteration. It is a tool for exploring and preparing, not for deciding.
- Exploring early directions and visual territories quickly.
- Producing variations once a direction has been chosen.
- Summarising research and organising information.
- Building rough mock-ups to test an idea.
What it cannot replace
Packaging has to work in a specific category, for a specific shopper, at a specific moment. Judging whether it does requires an understanding of context that no tool can substitute for.
- Strategy: deciding what a brand should stand for and say first.
- Judgement: knowing which of many options is right, and why.
- Craft: hierarchy, typography and detail that hold up on a real pack.
- Accountability: someone who answers for the result.
“Speed is useful.Judgement is what makes the output worth using.”
A sensible way to use it
The most effective approach we see is simple. Let technology widen the options and save time on repetition, and keep the decisions with people who understand the brand, the category and the shopper.
The goal has not changed: packaging that is noticed, understood and chosen.