What is "Senior Friendly" Caps and Closures?
At least 90% of the adults must be able to open the packaging within 5 minutes in order for the packaging to be considered senior friendly.
Demographics Demand Senior-Friendly Packaging
Grandparents are playing an ever larger role in the raising of children. 5.8 million children currently live with their grandparents in the U.S., compared to 4.5 million in 2000.
This means any packaging must be as easy for a grandparent to open as it is difficult for the grandchild to open.
Modern child-resistant closures have worked well for both keeping children out and letting older patients in:
Research conducted (Dr. Alaster Yoxall at the University of Sheffield) showed, among other things, that between the ages of 65 and 75, people lose 50% of their manual strength and dexterity.
What Type of Packaging do Seniors Prefer?
Consumers overwhelmingly preferred caps with course ribbing.
The reasons for this preference given by consumers were primarily linked to ease of opening: “bigger ridges fitting better in the hand” and the clearer directions coming from either raised or printed lettering as opposed to pictograms.
“The difficulty is balancing regulatory requirements, symptoms of disease (poor eyesight, stiff joints) and an explosion of new devices complicating the landscape. Different disabilities offer different challenges. Package design must include real-life testing, especially with the trend to do more at home, usability is of fundamental importance.”
Check Out Our User-Friendly Solutions in the Mold-Rite Packaging Catalog
