Tilda Eriksson
No one sets out to build a packaging portfolio with hundreds of variants.
It usually starts with a reasonable request.
A retailer wants a different pack size. A market needs a local version. A category manager asks for a seasonal design. A customer wants a multipack. A new claim requires a small artwork change.
The request is approved because, on its own, it makes sense.
Then another one arrives.
And another.
Years later, the packaging portfolio can contain far more variants than anyone originally intended. Some are high-volume products that clearly earn their place. Others exist because they solved a specific problem at a specific point in time — and simply never went away.
This is how SKU proliferation happens.
The problem is not necessarily the number of SKUs. It is the complexity that accumulates around them: different designs, pack sizes, artwork masters, specifications, suppliers, production requirements and data records.
The real cost can remain hidden because no single team owns the entire picture.
Why no one decides to have 400 SKUs
SKU proliferation is rarely the result of one major decision. It is usually the result of many small decisions that are individually difficult to challenge.
Consider a typical product family.
A brand launches with three pack sizes. A year later, one retailer requests a special format. Another market needs a localized version. Marketing introduces a limited edition. Procurement changes a supplier, which requires a different specification. Then a new regulation creates another artwork variation.
Each change has a reason.
But the portfolio is rarely reviewed with the same discipline as the individual requests.
This creates the “one more variant” pattern.
The problem with this pattern is that every new variant can create consequences beyond the product itself. A new SKU may require another artwork master, another approval route, another packaging specification, another item number, another supplier setup or another production configuration.
None of those costs necessarily appear on the original business case for the variant.
Over time, the portfolio becomes harder to understand and harder to manage.
This is why packaging complexity is not simply a design or tooling problem. It can be the accumulated result of years of decisions made across different functions, markets and moments.
The four layers of packaging complexity
A useful way to understand packaging portfolio management is to look at complexity across several connected layers.
1. Design complexity
Design complexity appears when products within the same family follow different visual or structural rules without a clear commercial reason.
One product has its own layout. Another uses a different hierarchy. A third has a unique template because that was how the product was originally created.
Individually, these differences may seem harmless.
Across a large portfolio, they create maintenance work.
More design families mean more templates to manage, more guidelines to maintain and more decisions for teams to make. They can also make future redesigns slower because there is no clear architecture showing what should remain consistent and what should change.
The question is not whether every pack should look identical.
It is whether every difference has a reason.
2. Commercial complexity
Commercial complexity comes from variants that have become difficult to justify economically.
A pack size may have low annual volume but still require the same attention as a high-volume SKU. A channel-specific version may sell only in a small number of locations. A historical variant may remain active because nobody has formally decided to retire it.
This is where long tail SKUs become important.
A small number of products may account for most of the volume, while a much larger number of low-volume variants create a disproportionate amount of management work.
That does not automatically mean the long tail should disappear.
Some low-volume products have strategic value. They may serve an important customer, market or price point.
The issue is whether that value is known and intentional.
3. Artwork complexity
Artwork is often where portfolio complexity becomes visible first.
More variants can mean more masters, more localized files, more versions and more approval cycles.
A seemingly small difference — such as a market-specific claim or language adaptation — can create another artwork route that has to be maintained over the product lifecycle.
Over time, teams can end up spending significant effort maintaining files that are rarely used.
This creates costs that are easy to overlook because they are spread across design, marketing, regulatory, procurement and production.
Poor artwork management can also create less visible costs through revisions, delays and errors. The issue is not only how many artworks exist, but how many exceptions the organization needs to manage around them.
4. Data and production complexity
The fourth layer is often the least visible: the data behind the packaging.
Different names for similar items. Duplicate IDs. Inconsistent specifications. Multiple records for what appears to be the same packaging component.
These issues make simple questions surprisingly difficult to answer.
Which version is current?
Which specification belongs to which pack?
How many active variants actually exist?
Which supplier produces each version?
What happens when the product changes?
When packaging data is fragmented, production decisions become more dependent on manual checking and individual knowledge.
This is why SKU rationalization packaging should not be treated as a simple exercise in deleting items from a list. Reducing visible SKU count without understanding the underlying design, artwork, commercial and data structures can simply move the complexity somewhere else.
For more on how packaging architecture can create structure across a large assortment, see Collabra’s work with Apoteksgruppen: Collabra Work.
Complexity vs. variety: when does a variant earn its place?
Not every additional SKU is a problem.
Variety can be commercially important. Different pack sizes may serve different price points. A market may require local language or regulatory information. A retailer may have a specific format that delivers meaningful sales.
The goal is not to make every portfolio smaller.
The goal is to distinguish useful variety from unmanaged complexity.
A useful question is:
What does this variant contribute that another existing variant cannot?
That contribution could be revenue, margin, market access, customer requirements, brand positioning or another clearly defined business objective.
If the answer is strong, the complexity may be justified.
If the answer is “we have always had it” or “someone might need it”, the variant deserves a closer look.
This distinction matters because a smaller portfolio is not automatically a better portfolio. The objective of packaging portfolio management is to create a structure where every meaningful difference has a reason — and where unnecessary differences can be identified.
5 warning signs your portfolio has outgrown its structure
You do not need to count every SKU before noticing that complexity may be getting out of control.
Look for these five warning signs.
1. Nobody can give you the same SKU count
Ask three teams how many active packaging variants exist.
If brand, procurement and packaging operations produce three different answers, the problem may be deeper than reporting.
It suggests that “what counts as a variant” has not been consistently defined.
2. You have masters that nobody wants to retire
Old artwork masters often survive because deleting them feels risky.
The team may not know whether a market still needs the file, whether a customer still uses the variant or whether the artwork is connected to an active product.
The result is a growing library of files that must be understood before anyone can safely make a change.
3. Pack sizes exist without a clear volume owner
Some pack formats have low or unpredictable demand, but nobody is responsible for explaining why they remain active.
When there is no clear commercial owner, the default decision is often to keep the SKU.
That makes the portfolio grow in one direction: outward.
4. The same packaging seems to have several IDs
Duplicate or inconsistent identifiers are a classic sign that complexity has moved into the data layer.
Even if the physical packaging is similar, disconnected records can create additional work for procurement, production and artwork teams.
5. Exceptions have become normal
If teams regularly say things like “this one is different” or “that market has its own process”, exceptions may no longer be exceptions.
They may be evidence that the portfolio structure has not kept pace with the assortment.
A simple self-check before approving the next SKU
Before saying yes to the next variant request, ask five questions.
1. What specific customer or business need does this variant solve?
Be precise. “More choice” is not enough.
2. Can an existing SKU solve the same need?
Sometimes the answer is a change in positioning, pack configuration or channel strategy rather than another permanent variant.
3. What additional packaging work does this create?
Consider design, artwork, approvals, specifications, suppliers, production and data — not just the physical packaging component.
4. Who owns the variant commercially?
There should be someone who can explain its expected volume, value and role in the portfolio.
5. What is the exit plan?
If the variant is seasonal, promotional, experimental or tied to a specific customer, define what happens when that reason disappears.
These questions do not need to block innovation.
They simply make the cost of complexity visible before it becomes permanent.
Where to start if the answers worry you
The first step is not necessarily to start cutting SKUs.
Start by making the portfolio visible.
Bring together the information that normally sits in separate places: product and SKU lists, pack sizes, artwork masters, markets, suppliers, production requirements and relevant commercial data.
Then look for patterns.
Which variants account for most of the volume?
Which create the most exceptions?
Where do duplicate designs or artwork masters appear?
Which pack sizes have little or no clear commercial owner?
Where are different IDs or specifications describing essentially the same thing?
This is where the Pareto principle can be useful. In many packaging portfolios, complexity is not distributed evenly. A relatively small part of the assortment can be responsible for a disproportionate share of exceptions, production effort or workflow friction.
Finding that concentration changes the conversation.
Instead of asking, “How do we reduce the number of SKUs?”, you can ask a more useful question:
“Where is complexity actually costing us the most?”
That shift helps teams protect the variants that genuinely matter while focusing simplification efforts where they can have the greatest effect.
It also connects portfolio decisions to the broader packaging strategy. Collabra’s packaging strategy services take a portfolio-level view rather than treating each packaging decision as an isolated project.
Complexity is the result of decisions, not just the number of SKUs
SKU proliferation rarely announces itself.
There is no moment when someone decides to create an unnecessarily complicated packaging portfolio. Complexity usually arrives through reasonable decisions made one at a time.
That is what makes it difficult to see — and why simply counting SKUs is not enough.
The useful starting point is to understand the different layers of complexity: design, commercial, artwork, data and production. From there, teams can identify which differences create real value and which have accumulated through habit.
The goal is not fewer SKUs at any cost.
It is a packaging portfolio where complexity has a reason, ownership is clear and the cost of each additional variant can be understood before another “yes” becomes permanent.
If you want to understand where that complexity is concentrated in your own portfolio, Collabra’s Packaging Complexity Audit can provide a structured starting point for mapping the portfolio and identifying where simplification may have the greatest impact.
