Intruder Alert!
June 2005
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Holograms can do more than just attract consumers. They can also protect against counterfeiting, diversion, and product tampering.
ACCORDING TO MARTY Kelem, sales and marketing manager, Spectratek Technologies, a consumer travels at seven miles per hour down store aisles, which only allows a product one-tenth of a second to make its impact. An impulse purchase occurs half of the time when a consumer visually notices the product, but that rate raises to 85 percent when the product is touched by the consumer.
This is one of the main reasons for all of the product displays at the checkout aisles of retail stores. While a consumer is patiently (or otherwise) waiting to be rung up at the grocery store, he or she has an opportunity to peruse the shelves packed with last minute items, like packages of bubble gum and candy. Now, however, with self-checkout lanes, consumers are more concerned with trying to make a speedy get-a-way with their bags of groceries than looking around at the different impulse-buy choices.
Catching the customer's eye was once the only job of holographic substrates, but today, security applications are becoming more and more important, as counterfeiting concerns increase throughout the consumer products industry. Of course, the need for heightened homeland security has driven the need for holograms on passports, drivers' licenses, and other government documents, but security is also an issue in the pharmaceutical, consumer marketed goods, licensed products, and apparel markets.
Behind all the glitter
The holographic market can span many end-use segments, including beverages, cereal, toothpaste, cigarettes, software, games, and toys—more for shelf appeal than for security reasons—but security has become an important manifestation of the use of holographic materials. The reason? The consumer wants to know he or she is getting an authentic item.
"Security brand protection is very important to not only the consumer, but also the consumer product company (CPC)," said Eric Bartholomay, product development manager, Toray Plastics (America). "Sports merchandise, like labels on authentic team hats and golf ball boxes, seem to be an expanding market."
Apart from merchandise labels, holograms have carved out a niche in the pharmaceutical industry. "Rising prescription drug costs and the use of the Internet to purchase drugs (where it is difficult for consumers to know where the medications are actually coming from) makes anti-counterfeiting both a public safety need and a revenue protection measure for drug manufacturers," said Patti Gettinger, market manager, Graphic Packaging International.
ACCORDING TO MARTY Kelem, sales and marketing manager, Spectratek Technologies, a consumer travels at seven miles per hour down store aisles, which only allows a product one-tenth of a second to make its impact. An impulse purchase occurs half of the time when a consumer visually notices the product, but that rate raises to 85 percent when the product is touched by the consumer.
This is one of the main reasons for all of the product displays at the checkout aisles of retail stores. While a consumer is patiently (or otherwise) waiting to be rung up at the grocery store, he or she has an opportunity to peruse the shelves packed with last minute items, like packages of bubble gum and candy. Now, however, with self-checkout lanes, consumers are more concerned with trying to make a speedy get-a-way with their bags of groceries than looking around at the different impulse-buy choices.
Catching the customer's eye was once the only job of holographic substrates, but today, security applications are becoming more and more important, as counterfeiting concerns increase throughout the consumer products industry. Of course, the need for heightened homeland security has driven the need for holograms on passports, drivers' licenses, and other government documents, but security is also an issue in the pharmaceutical, consumer marketed goods, licensed products, and apparel markets.
Behind all the glitter
The holographic market can span many end-use segments, including beverages, cereal, toothpaste, cigarettes, software, games, and toys—more for shelf appeal than for security reasons—but security has become an important manifestation of the use of holographic materials. The reason? The consumer wants to know he or she is getting an authentic item.
"Security brand protection is very important to not only the consumer, but also the consumer product company (CPC)," said Eric Bartholomay, product development manager, Toray Plastics (America). "Sports merchandise, like labels on authentic team hats and golf ball boxes, seem to be an expanding market."
Apart from merchandise labels, holograms have carved out a niche in the pharmaceutical industry. "Rising prescription drug costs and the use of the Internet to purchase drugs (where it is difficult for consumers to know where the medications are actually coming from) makes anti-counterfeiting both a public safety need and a revenue protection measure for drug manufacturers," said Patti Gettinger, market manager, Graphic Packaging International.
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