Packaging Machinery Buyers Decision Making Timeline

I recently attended a seminar hosted by Packaging World magazine. They had completed a comprehensive study of over 500 packaging machinery buyers and 200 suppliers. The seminar covered numerous topics pertaining to the packaging machinery buying cycle. Perhaps the most interesting statistics they discussed examined how and when packaging machinery buyers learn about the products they need.

Most projects that require the purchase of packaging machinery are vetted long before the Purchase Order is written. Forty-six percent of buyers look at machinery when there is not even a project. When there is a new project starting to shape-up, seventy-three percent of buyers actively look for information about it. This is still in the infancy stages of the project, long before there is funding available. The survey went on to uncover that by the time the project is actually funded, close to 80% already knew who they would choose as their supplier.

Not surprisingly it is up to the suppliers to make sure their product is kept front and center in the mind of potential purchasers. How is that best accomplished? Read my next blog.

For more information on the Packaging World survey, contact Healthcare Packaging Summit Media Group, Inc. at (312) 222-1010.

The author, Marge Bonura, is the Director of Sales & Marketing for New England Machinery, Inc. (NEM). NEM is a leading packaging machinery manufacturer of bottle unscramblers, cappers, orienters, retorquers, lidders, pluggers, pump sorter/placers, scoop feeders, hopper elevators and much more. The company has been in business since 1974 selling to the food, beverage, pharmaceutical, personal care, chemical, household products, automotive and other industries. For more information on NEM, visit their website at www.neminc.com.