To keep the booklet intact as it follows along with the child for several years, it has traditionally been enclosed in a removable plastic casing. Often these casings are donated to the clinics by partner companies such as Nestlé.
Co-creating the concept
Metsä Board’s Packaging Design team at the Äänekoski Excellence Centre took on the challenge to design a durable paperboard casing to replace traditional plastic solutions. The development was done in co-operation with Nestlé Finland’s Infant Nutrition & Dairy team that has decades long experience of working with the Finnish child health clinics.
The concept was first tested with a series of interviews with healthcare professionals working in the clinics and later finetuned in online workshops between Metsä Board’s design and technical experts and Nestlé’s product specialists.
Recognisable patterns on renewable materials
The aim was to create a casing from renewable materials that could endure years of usage but was easily recycled. Rigidness and good printability were required qualities. The casing also needed a structure that could be easily and cost-effectively manufactured by existing production lines. Inner pockets was an important feature as parents use them to store additional materials and notes given to them by the clinics.
The cover bears a simple yellow smiley on a red background, as babies are interested by images mimicking human faces and see patterns in high-contrasting colours better. Many Finnish families remember this particular simplistic smiley well, since it has been used in materials provided to them through the child health clinics since the 1970’s.
The first batch of the casing has already been provided to selected clinics around Finland and has received lots of positive feedback.
