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Plastic Packages Cause Injuries, Revolt
massysett writes "Everybody has been frustrated by plastic retail packaging that's nearly impossible to open. New toys and electronic gadgets arrive encased in plastic bubbles. Manufacturers say the packages protect goods and make them look nice, but opening them can be difficult enough to cause injuries that land people in the emergency room. Manufacturers have an appropriate term for the frustration: wrap rage. One man even invented a cutter designed specifically for cracking open plastic clamshells."
Don't worry, I'm sure we'll get a dupe by then... :-P
The point is that you're not.
I work in a PC store and there's loads of stuff that can make a thief a quick buck in a few seconds. Ink cartidges are the biggest target, with Lexmark (Crappy cardboard rectangle) boxes being found open without contents all the time, whereas the really-tough-sealed ones aren't being nicked. Epson have a compromise, they've got the hard-squishy plastic shell (that milk bottles are made of) with a plastic film coating over the front. You need to pierce and open these (knife makes simple work) but it's not too easy to do instore.
Stores care more about stuff going missing from the shelves then it being purchased and not being opened at home. Granted this stuff is too hard to open and they need to sort it out, but slowly compromises will come.
It's all to help prevent shoplifting.
Maybe, but that's not obvious to me. Perhaps the major reasons are to assist in packing and prevent damage in transit. Small widgets are sorted and packed at high speed by machines. If you design a package that can be opened by the pretty feeble forces a human fingertip can exert, then it's not going to be able to be sorted at 80 MPH by the metal claw of a robot.
You're looking at it from the point of view of the thing sitting on the display hook in the store. But that's near the end of its life before use: it has a long history from factory floor to the store that you need to consider, and there's a good chance major aspects of the packaging are designed to meet the needs of distribution and transport.
It must be the same logic used by automobile engineers who design cars so that you have to remove the engine, radiator hoses, power steering pump, air-conditioning compressor, and exaust manifold in order to change the spark plugs.
Let's have a show of hands from all the kind folks who have attempted to open a plastic bag of spaghetti at the seams, only to have it rip down the sides sending noodles flying all over the kitchen floor. I've never understood the logic of using a glue that is stronger than the material it is intended to seal.
Or go to the dollar store and get those indestructible scissors that "As seen on TV!" can cut through a penny.
BTW, the plastic clam-shell packaging doesn't piss me off as much as DVD and CD packaging. There's nothing that starts the pounding in my head like the "Peel here" tab that can't be peeled, complete with too-strong glue that forces you to choose between cutting it along the seam with a razor blade and leaving it, or cutting it and then peeling it off from the unglued center, warping and stretching your brand new $23 DVD packaging. (Lets face facts here, I'm paying for the convenience of the packaging (which includes the DVD itself AND the case), not the movie itself, which is available for free (minus ISP costs) online).
"Prediction: within 10 years, Windows will be a Linux distribution." Me, 7-6-2016
I use a good pair of regular household scissors.
No, not the kind that are stamped sheet metal that are popular now. The kind that are forged steel. Not that hard to find. And they work fine for cutting the welded seams on this sort of packaging. That's really all you need to do is cut away the welded seams. Which are right out on the edge of the packaging.
I like this form of packaging, because once you know how to open it, if you need to return an item, everything just slides back into the hard form of the package. You only cut the welds off one or at most two edges.
I don't recall anyone insisting...
Just this morning I was attaching some caster wheels to some furniture, and realised a needed a longer screw attachment for my drill. I went and bought one and sure enough it was sealed up good. Took me a bit of hacking to open, and that was with my toolbox right next to me. Again, opening items like this is easy enough, opening them without damaging them is another matter.
Another one that pisses me off is when they print the instructions on the cardboard which is sandwiched between the layers of packaging, so just cutting through it with scissors means cutting through the instructions. Not that I ever read instructions. *cough*
Then there is the whole environmental thing... where does all this packaging go once the item has been unpacked!!!