This isn’t exactly pit worthy, but it’s enough where I thought people would enjoy reading and making their own contributions.
My wife bought some “Peaches and Cream Parfaits” because she had a coupon. They were tasty enough, but they were packaged in a stupid little clear plastic cup that was rather ornate looking. The end result was frustration because no spoon in the world would get all off the contents out of cup. I don’t why but it really bugged me.
It made me think of those yogurt containers that seem like they’re developed in an inverted fashion. Same as above, it just doesn’t seem you get all of the yogurt that you’re supposed to have.
So, what are your “What idiot designed this package” moments?
Those plastic packages a lot of electronics come in these days, the ones that can’t be opened without a knife or a pair of scissors. And once you’ve created an opening, the edges are hard and sharp enough that you’re pretty much guaranteed to cut yourself.
The other thing that is not good about those plastic packages for the fruit and cream parfaits, as well as similar packages of “canned” fruit, is that they are much more fragile than cans. And if one or more of the 4 packs breaks on the way home from the store, it’s too bad for the customer.
It doesn’t work as an anti-theft thing either; what they did at a store I worked at was to steal some scissors and use them to open the packages and take the stuff and leave the rest for us to deal with.
HIJACK
A neat tip for opening those impossible “clamshell” packages - use a standard can opener. It works great, and there’s very little risk of cutting off your fingers with a big knife or heavy scissors.
I usually take a knife to some point between the edge and the product, slice into it and then pull it apart by hand. I’ve found it both easier and safer to avoid cutting through the edges at all.
Sugar, pasta, rice and other loose granular foods all seem to come in crackly plastic bags heat-crimped at the top - there’s often a little self-adhesive tab attached to the packet - indicating that you’re supposed to pull apart the top of the bag, use some, then reseal with the sticky tab.
Once opened, the bags nearly always split very easily and cannot be resealed. In those rare occasions that the crimped seam comes apart without the bag starting to tear, the adhesive tab will be found to be insufficiently sticky and will not hold the bag closed.
La Madeline’s restaurant has these very small dessert servings for a buck and a half that are served in little square based, flute-type, plastic cups.
No eating utensil is capable of reaching into those square corners, and I hate leaving so much of the tiny and kind-of-expesive-for-what-you-get dessert.
I hate the Disney DVDs because the case almost always comes with those stupid tabs that keeps the case closed. No one else uses them, so every time I go to watch a movie with the kids I get thrown by the stupid package that won’t open because once again I’ve forgotten that that particular DVD case has tabs!
The standard CD jewel case. Unbraced arms made of brittle clear polystyrene. Can only be opened if you have two hands. Possibly the worst industrial design of the 20th century.
I take these pills that can’t be beat for bad packaging.
The pills come in packages of 4, as you take one pill per week. As an additional thing, the pills are supposed to be taken on an empty stomach with a full glass of one, and then you take no other food or liquid for half an hour. So, first thing in the morning, no coffee.
(I should note here that I am Not A Morning Person, at all. So I’m doing this at 6 a.m. when I barely have my eyes open and am not particularly functional. But even when I have the forethought to open my pill the night before, it’s still not easy.)
First there is a little zip strip, of the zigzag kind mentioned. But it only pulls off the top layer. This is when it works. Of course usually I have to tear it off in little pieces, usually tearing off the last thing I could get a grip on, and then find a can opener to pry up another edge to tear some more.
THEN you have to push the pill, which is in an aluminum bubble, up through the thinner layer of paper that you have revealed by zipping off the tab.
AAAaaarrgggh!
And after all that, you STILL can’t have coffee for 30 minutes, nor can you go back to bed (have to remain upright–standing or sitting–for 30 min.)
It comes in these sheets of little plastic blisters seperated by perforations that won’t tear until you fold them back and forth repeatedly. The individual blisters are backed with a layer of paper and a layer of foil that can only be grasped by a 1mm tab. When you pull it back you usually only get the paper layer and you’re lucky if it doesn’t tear requiring a knife to cut open the package. If you do get the paper off, you need a long thumbnail to run around the edge of the foil to finally free the gum.
All of this while jonesing for your fix!
Or you could do like me and go back to cigarettes–which are strangely easy to open.
