Plastic card manufacturer Placard and packaging design firm Burgopak partnered to create a premium, interactive mailer for fintech startup Emerge’s new bank card.
The pack is made from 300 GSM artboard printed with holographic foil and spot UV, delivering a tactile, high-end feel intended to elevate what is typically a routine card unboxing experience.
Sasha Fowler, creative director at Emerge, who led the creative direction and concept development behind the pack, says that from the outset the team wanted the bank card’s packaging to be an extension of Emerge’s brand.
“From the get-go, we wanted the bank card’s packaging to be an extension of Emerge’s brand. The goal was to elevate what’s typically a routine experience into something worth remembering, a design that would surprise, delight, and embody the brand’s forward-thinking personality,” she says.
Visually, the pack needed to communicate innovation, she added, describing a look that is sleek, with striking colours accented by holographic foil. The feel was equally important, Fowler said, noting that the team wanted the pack to be high quality, with a satisfyingly solid way of opening.
“We design everything, from our app to our physical touchpoints to feel considered, premium, and unmistakably Emerge,” she says, adding, “We’re delighted with the final packaging and are looking forward to the reaction from our customers.”
The packaging features a dual-slide opening mechanism designed to turn the card reveal into an interactive experience, while also protecting the card during transit.
“Emerge wanted a pack that not only protected the card during transit, but also converted what would be a mundane experience into something more interesting,” says Tess Barone, GM, sales & marketing at Placard. “The dual-slide mechanism makes the reveal interactive and fun.” She added that manufacturing a pack with a belt-driven opening mechanism requires tolerances of less than half a millimetre to ensure smooth opening and closing action. “This is what Burgopak specialises in and why we partner with them. They precision manufacture their packs so that the opening mechanism works perfectly, every time,” Barone says.