The AidPod for ColaLife has all the right components to become the packaging system that definitively demonstrates to the world that packaging can not only add value to consumers' lives, but it can actually save lives.
Recently garnering the prestigious Diamond Award at the 2013 DuPont Packaging Innovation Awards, the AidPod is paradoxically simple and complex; and simultaneously life-giving and inspiring.
And inspired is exactly what DuPont Packaging Innovation Awards Lead Juror David Luttenberger, CPP, was when he presented the story behind the AidPod package and project to his fellow jurors.
"In my nearly 25 years in packaging, I've never before seen a package with such a compelling back-story and with such positive and direct forward-leaning social, economic, and health implications," says Luttenberger, vp/packaging strategist for leading consumer insights research firm CEB Iconoculture. "Even before presenting the AidPod to my fellow jurors, I instinctively knew it would earn the Diamond Award. I also knew I wanted to become involved and use my global packaging network to raise awareness and generate support for the AidPod and the ColaLife concept."
Luttenberger immediately reached out to Simon and Jane Berry, co-founder's of Colalife and two of the key developers behind the AidPod, and pitched his idea to enlist the support of the global packaging industry. The Berry's, who are based in Zambia, responded immediately and were excited at the possibilities.
After meeting personally with ColaLife's public health advisor and principal investigator, Rohit Ramchandani, a Doctor of Public Health (DrPH) candidate at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and founder and executive director of Antara Global Health Advisors, Luttenberger was able to put an outreach plan in place.
"We started with the concept of using the empty spaces between crated bottles of Coca-Cola, in order to get essential medicines to remote and underserved areas where they are most needed," says Ramchandani. "In Zambia, we have locally adapted the Aidpod into the Kit Yamoyo, an anti-diarrhea treatment kit that co-packages the medicines needed to address this second leading cause of global childhood mortality."
Ramchandani welcomed Luttenberger's support noting that recognition and support within the packaging industry will help raise awareness, garner collaboration and help open possibilities for the multi-sectoral partnerships needed to address global health challenges.
Through the non-profit fund raising organization, Global Giving, a registered 501(c)3 organization, Luttenberger is asking individual packaging professionals, packaging suppliers, CPGs and retailers, brand and package design firms, packaging and allied trade associations, packaging institutes or anyone compelled by the concept, to make a donation to the AidPod for ColaLife project.
"At this point, I haven't set a financial goal for donations," explains Luttenberger, who is volunteering his time and resources to the AidPod for ColaLife project, and who also has faith that the global packaging industry will step up in a big way. "I believe the AidPod is more than an award-winning packaging system. It's a life-saving project that uses a revolutionary package and globally recognized distribution network to save lives. My hope is that this package will help sway consumers opinions about the enormous value packaging delivers to people around the world."
