Supermarkets have aisles full of interesting products, but most come in cans, boxes, bags or packages. Most of the packaging we take for granted has been around for ages, but if you want an experience in terror, go to the dairy aisle and look at the varieties of yogurt on the shelves. The first challenge of any visitor to the yogurt aisle is to manoever a cleverly constructed calamity of containers vying for attention and a wad of your hard-earned bills.
In the good old days, yogurt came in a cup with a narrower bottom and slightly wider top. Now they come in a longer, inverted version like Yoplait’s, with a topple-proof wide bottom and narrow top that allows a spoon to go in but less product to safely come out. They stack nicely on the shelf, like nursery blocks waiting for a two-year-old to whack them playfully. The yogurt is wonderful, and the flavors a palace of delights for the palate, but the reward of eating it is off-balanced by the effort it takes to navigate the strange architecture of the cup.
Dannon, on the other hand, replaced the ordinary boring cups about a year ago and substituted a round-edged rectangular opaque plastic container, surrounded by the label like a sheath and topped with a peelable foil lid. These also stack well on the shelf, like rows of little bricks. It’s also good yogurt, with enjoyable standards and seasonable flavors like Harvest Pear (with real pear chunks inside) that make such a singular lunch worthwhile. The contents are visible on the bottom, but a strange star-like pattern radiates from the middle of the bottom from the inside. It’s easier to use a spoon, but scraping around those ridges in the bottom is futile. The corners are still not friendly to the average spoon.
For true container enjoyment, Chobani puts their greek yogurt in a simple small bowl. Easy to access, stir and enjoy. The spoon can move freely inside and scoop out every last morsel of blood orange, pomegranate or passion fruit. Pricier than the others, and takes up more room on the shelf, but definitely a winner.
Whoever designs containers has to be somebody who rarely navigates the fridge at home.They’re probably under pressure to design some strange container, and they have chronic irregularity under the stress. Which is why they should eat more yogurt and get a better understanding of the container.
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