The HOW Design conference has always been a special conference for the Taylor Box Company. This year, we’re debuting a new product and relaunching a legacy product. Below is an interview with Taylor Box Company President Dan Shedd.
How many years has Taylor Box been exhibiting at HOW?
This is our tenth year exhibiting at HOW.
What do you love about the HOW conference?
We find that it’s a great mix of visual and structural design innovators, which is our key audience. The fact that the conference draws from a national audience regardless of where the show is held is important to us as we work with clients from coast to coast. Having many designers from both agencies and within major brands provides exposure of our packaging solutions to these important creatives. Finally, the show also offers us the opportunity to network with other designers and artists.
Where did the idea of the Taylor Giant come from?
We just purchased a state of the art Emmeci 2012MEB Mechtronic, which was installed this April. This machine has more capabilities than any other box production machine in the world today. The signature difference is that it will produce boxes as deep as 11.7 inches, long as 27.50 inches, and wide as 16.75 inches. It’s an ideal machine for liquor packaging, book slipcases, and large retail boxes. As this machine is capable of making GIANT boxes, we thought it would be fun to build a campaign around a box giant.
It will also make smaller sizes, which we’re highlighting with the Taylor Mini promotion next to the Taylor Giant promotion. The machine will also produce asymmetrical boxes, which, once again, is unique to this equipment, but we’ll begin to highlight those capabilities during the HOW Live event and then continue throughout the year. Mini-Giant boxes can be made as short as 1.50 inches, skinny as 1.125 inches and shallow as 0.375 inches.
Who was part of the design process?
Once we had decided on the theme of the campaign, we asked Susan Doyle, Associate Professor of Illustration at RISD, to assist us with sketching out our box giant. She illustrated some concepts and then suggested we find an artist-designer to work on the actual giant construction. So, one afternoon back in February, we invited Hillel O’Leary, a sculptor and RISD grad, along with Doyle, our design team, and marketing team for an ideation session to map out the strategy and see what we could come up with. At the end of the meeting, we had two teams in place: one to develop the GIANT marketing plan and one to finish the Giant design and then actually build it. Dave Shedd, our Senior Design Engineer, worked with Hillel to provide structural guidance and suggest how to make use of actual boxes in the design. Julie, our Sales and Marketing Director, worked with Alan Buff from Growth Partners, Patrick Hughes from BuzzFarmers, and Sales and Marketing Associate Julianne to create the marketing plan, develop the social media, trade show collateral, and overall logistics.
How long did it take to create the Giant?
The Taylor Giant – also known in Twitterland as #TaylorGiant – began in the Engineering studio, where Dave built out the frame structure and then worked with Hillel on populating the giant with his suit of colorful paper wrapped boxes. As the Giant needed to be able to “see” everyone who would be coming to visit with him and snap a selfie, Dave and Hillel designed giant blue LED eyes and matching logo on his chest. TaylorGiant was finally completed and stood fully erect with eyes blazing on May 2 in the Taylor Box Warehouse. As you can see from the picture, he looks pretty pleased with himself.
Tell us about Taylor Box’s giant box product.
We brought some very large paper-wrapped rigid boxes to the HOW Live on May 12 in Boston at the Hynes Convention Center. These boxes are as much as 40% larger than any previously available rigid set-up boxes. Here’s a picture of some of the boxes with a ball point pen for reference. The 2012MEB also makes asymmetrical boxes, and we brought those along to show visitors. (picture here).
Tell us about your Portfoliobox product.
We’re relaunching Portfoliobox later this year. For those that don’t know, the Portfoliobox is a book-style presentation folder created by Stuart Einhorn and John Romano. In 2013, the Portfoliobox company joined the Taylor Box team and set out to make the Portfoliobox widely available This unique folder case is perfect for artists, photographers, and students looking for an elegant way to house their work. You’ll be able to order a custom Portfoliobox online very soon!
To learn more about the giant boxes the Taylor Box Company can create for your next promotional item, contact us at info@taylorbox.com or call Julianne at 1.800.304.6361.
Join the Conversation