Special Delivery: How One Box Cuts Packaging in Half

Innovation

Learn how Nike's packaging team is ditching the double box to help reduce waste—and re-imagining what a shoe box can do.

Last updated: 13 April 2022
6 min read
Nike's One Box Cuts Packaging in Half

Presented by Move to Zero: Nike's Journey towards zero carbon and zero waste to help protect the future of sport.


"Packaging is sometimes an afterthought", says Rich Hastings, the mastermind behind Nike's custom shoe-box designs for more than 20 years. "But what people may not realise is that it can have a huge impact on the environment".

You may have noticed that impact when the shoes you bought online arrive in their shoe box, surrounded by another box. "We knew we had the opportunity to make our existing model better", he says.

Rich and team had the chance to do just that when they worked on the 2020 release of Space Hippie—a line of shoes made from at least 25 percent to 50 percent recycled material by weight that needed an audaciously low-impact container to match their future-focused design.

Nike's One Box Cuts Packaging in Half

Rich Hastings helped bring One Box to life after working on the Space Hippie box (centre), which ditched the box within a
box we're all familiar with.

"Space Hippie was the jumping off point", says Erica Swanson from sustainable product operations. "We wanted to have an innovative system that delivered a shoe in its own container, rather than delivering a box within another box".

So when you buy one pair of shoes online, this eliminates an entire box from your order—and your recycling bin. Sounds simple, but like any industry-leading concept, it would take a lot of work to bring to fruition.

Test and Learn

"It was meant to be a limited release. So we said, 'Let's be daring and try something we're not sure is going to work'", says Rich of the sneaker collection that was delivered in its own oblong shoe box.

"But the shoes were so popular, we had to scale up and fast. We got a lot of feedback that the box wasn't durable enough to withstand the rigours of delivery, so we got to work updating it based on those learnings".

Nike's One Box Cuts Packaging in Half

Erica Swanson is helping take Nike to new heights with One Box. "We learnt that 86 percent of consumers said they
would like to work with brands to make them more sustainable", says Erica. "With One Box, we deliver on this need".

Rich and team ran a battery of engineering exercises, like crush tests that beat up the box, to make sure it would survive the journey to your door. Those tests helped the team build an even stronger container—and proved that the design could work on a way bigger scale.

The result of dreaming and testing big? Nike One Box. This current design can house almost any shoe Nike makes. And although it may look different from the box that started it all, its intent is the same: reduce waste.

Delivering shoes in their shoe box and ditching the outer box (plus any extra packaging) add up to big wins.

Compared to traditional packaging, One Box offers a 51-percent reduction in waste for single online orders regardless of the shoe inside.

Compared to traditional packaging, One
Box offers a 51-percent reduction in waste
for single online orders regardless of the
shoe inside.

Nike's One Box Cuts Packaging in Half

How do you make a box into a breakthrough? According to Chris Conklin, it comes down to obsessing over the details.

Less Is More

"Our team worked together to really obsess over how the customer would interact with the box", says Chris Conklin from packaging design.

Take a tour through the result of all that detailed work:

Nike's One Box Cuts Packaging in Half
  1. Stealthy Exterior
    From afar, One Box might seem underwhelming—but that's the whole point. "It was a strategic choice for security", says Chris of the logo-free design. "We didn't want the box advertising that new shoes were sitting on your doorstep".
  2. Tape-Free Returns
    The lid of the box is secured with an adhesive strip to cut down on tape waste. But sometimes things don't work out, so the team knew they also had to solve how shoppers would handle returns. That's why they added a second strip of adhesive that lets you reseal the box and return the shoes.
  3. No-Smudge Graphics
    "We tried using different colours for graphics inside the box", says Chris. "But when we noticed the ink rubbed off on white midsoles, we switched to white to keep the product perfect".

    And how we applied that white ink stayed true to the overall mission of reducing waste. "We were thinking about water use when printing", says Chris. "We wanted the design to be minimal enough that we could keep the overall footprint low".

If One Box shows up on your door, you'll see these features come to life on this shoe-box-delivery-container combo. You may also see a scuff or two. "Think of these as reminders that you helped remove an extra box from the recycling bin", suggests Erica.

The Future of Shoe Boxes

Does this mean One Box is going to replace all existing shoe boxes? No, not right away. Millions of units are being delivered this year and that number is only expected to grow through meticulous testing and refinement. "Even though it's large, we're still in pilot mode", says Erica. "There's opportunity for One Box to evolve over time—how it looks, what it's used for and how many boxes we can save".

And just as Space Hippie inspired this game-changing container, One Box is sparking new ideas for changing other packaging practices. For example, reducing the amount of paper used to stuff the toes of shoes or doing away with the plastic bags that encase individual apparel items.

Rich notes that it's part of a bigger story: Nike's overall push to reduce product packaging, an effort that is constantly evolving.

"We're really the leaders in this space, but we're just getting started".

Erica Swanson
Senior Director, Sustainable Product Operations

"We're really the leaders in this space, but
we're just getting started".

Erica Swanson
Senior Director, Sustainable Product Operations

For more: Visit Nike.com/Sustainability to follow each step in our journey and discover new ways we can Move to Zero carbon and zero waste together.

Photography: Ariel Fisher
Words: Rebecca Coolidge

Originally published: 13 April 2022

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