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Job Description
Position Summary
Paper Source and Barnes & Noble are looking for an experienced packaging designer to develop creative, eye-catching designs that resonate with the customer and product, reflects the brand aesthetics, and complies with health and safety regulations. This position supports the Design and Merchandise teams and reports directly to the Creative Director. This is a hybrid role, working in our downtown Chicago office at least three days a week.
Essential Job Responsibilities and Accountabilities
• Create functional packaging for all in-house designed products, and exclusive items by third-party vendors, based on direction from Design and Merchandise teams.
• Lead the design process for packaging materials for products, including brainstorming, sketching, creating prototypes, and assisting with template creation.
• Create packaging mock-ups to present to Design and Merchandise team and/or vendors to help visualize final packaging with the product.
• Communicate with members of the Merchandise and Compliance team to ensure accuracy of product information and to assist in writing product descriptions.
• Communicate with multiple product vendors, each with their own set of guidelines, to send and receive templates, create various packaging, and send production-ready files.
• Generate various types of labels, tags, and barcodes with format and file consistency.
• Demonstrate extreme organization in preparation of files, file-naming, and communication with multiple vendors and teams.
• Exhibit exceptional time-management skills to meet tight deadlines and balance multiple projects at once.
• Help to organize the packaging design process and create brand standards that can be shared with vendors when there is opportunity for their assistance on labels, tags, etc.
• Analyze market trends, customer needs and product details to conceptualize effective package designs that reflect the aesthetic of the company.
• Has a good eye for style and in-depth knowledge of packaging standards and regulations.
Position Requirements
• Bachelor’s Degree in graphic design, industrial design, or a related field
• 2+ years of related design experience required— consumer product packaging experience preferred.
• Proficiency in Adobe Creative Cloud Suite— Illustrator, InDesign, and Photoshop.
• Extensive knowledge of print production processes and terminology— typesetting, bleeds, die lines, color settings, preflight, etc.
• Familiarity with various packaging materials and basic understanding of consumer packaging healthy and safety regulations.
• Ability to work independently and able to manage multiple projects in a time sensitive environment.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills with willingness and excitement to collaborate.
• Exhibits strong attention to detail, ensuring high quality work even on the simplest requests.