Tilda Eriksson
Every packaging portfolio starts with a manageable number of SKUs. Then someone requests a new size. A regional team needs a localized variant. A retailer asks for an exclusive label. Each request gets approved. A few years later, the portfolio feels harder to control, and no single decision seems responsible.
That pattern is SKU proliferation in packaging, and it rarely announces itself as a strategic problem. It builds quietly through incremental approvals until the artwork team, procurement, and the brand manager all feel the weight at the same time. Collabra works with FMCG brand owners to map exactly where that accumulated complexity lives and build the structure to reduce it at the source.
This article breaks down how packaging portfolio complexity accumulates, what it looks like across four operational layers, and how to spot the warning signs before the next variant request tips the balance.
Key Takeaways: SKU Proliferation in Packaging
- SKU proliferation in packaging usually grows through years of incremental variant approvals, not through one large decision.
- Packaging complexity spans four layers: design, commercial, artwork, and production data, each compounding the others.
- Not all packaging variety is harmful. Variants that serve genuine market or regulatory needs earn their maintenance cost.
- Warning signs include rising artwork revision rounds, approval bottlenecks, and exceptions that nobody tracks centrally.
- Collabra helps brand owners audit where complexity concentrates and set clear criteria before approving the next SKU.
Why SKU Proliferation Rarely Starts with a Big Decision
Most packaging managers can point to the moment their portfolio felt overwhelming, but almost none can identify the decision that caused it. SKU proliferation is the accumulated result of hundreds of small approvals, each justified in isolation.
A category manager approves a new pack size. A regional team requests a localized flavour variant. A key account manager negotiates an exclusive label for a retailer. Each request clears its own business case. What nobody tallies is the cumulative impact on artwork templates, approval workflows, and master file counts.
Over time, those individually reasonable decisions create a portfolio where a small share of the assortment generates a disproportionate share of exceptions and production cost. Without a framework that tracks portfolio-wide impact, every "yes" adds invisible weight to the teams responsible for execution.
The Four Layers of Packaging Complexity in Practice
Packaging complexity is not one issue. It operates across four distinct layers, and each one compounds the others. Understanding where complexity concentrates is the first step toward reducing it.
Design Complexity
Every design family that diverges without a clear rationale introduces a permanent maintenance cost. More templates mean more review time, more chances for inconsistency, and more effort when regulations or brand guidelines change. When design architectures grow by habit rather than by strategy, teams spend cycles maintaining variations that no longer serve a purpose.
Commercial Complexity
Low-volume variants, redundant pack sizes, and duplicate propositions quietly inflate the number of SKUs that procurement and brand teams must manage. The challenge is that each variant was commercially justified at the time of approval. As L.E.K. Consulting's packaging study confirms, many brand owners now pursue active SKU rationalization to protect margins. Without portfolio audits that compare volume against maintenance cost, historical additions persist long after their business case expires.
Artwork Complexity
This layer is where the daily burden shows up most visibly. Unnecessary master files, heavy localization overhead, and manual one-off exceptions consume artwork team hours in ways that rarely appear on a dashboard. As regional and regulatory variations accumulate, master files multiply faster than most teams expect. Each master adds approval cycles, version control risk, and coordination effort.
Data and Production Complexity
Inconsistent naming conventions, duplicate product IDs, and disconnected specifications turn every production run into a small investigation. When packaging data grows organically alongside the SKU count, the gap between what the system says and what production needs widens. These issues stay invisible until a misprint or compliance audit surfaces them.
When Packaging Variety Earns Its Place
Not all variety is complexity. Some variants exist for real market, regulatory, or channel reasons, and those earn their maintenance cost. A pharmaceutical product that requires country-specific labeling is not the same problem as a consumer goods brand running six barely differentiated pack sizes in one market.
Blanket SKU reduction often cuts the wrong things. Effective portfolio management separates deliberate variety from accumulated complexity. Deliberate variety serves a documented purpose: a regulatory requirement, a proven volume threshold, a distinct consumer segment. Accumulated complexity is what remains when no one revisits the original justification.
The practical question is not "how many SKUs do we have?" It is "how many of them are still earning their place?"
Five Warning Signs Your Packaging Portfolio Has Outgrown Its Structure
If several of these patterns sound familiar, your portfolio may have outgrown its current processes.
1. Artwork revision rounds keep increasing
When the average number of revision rounds per artwork project trends upward, it usually signals that templates, guidelines, or approval criteria have not kept pace with the portfolio's growth. More variants mean more room for inconsistency, and more inconsistency means more rounds of corrections.
2. Approval workflows regularly stall or bypass the process
Bottlenecks in approval workflows often indicate that too many variants are competing for the same reviewers' attention. When deadlines slip, teams route approvals informally, which undermines traceability and compliance. If your team frequently works around the formal process, the structure is overloaded.
3. A small number of SKUs drive most of the exceptions
In many portfolios, a fraction of the total assortment is responsible for the majority of manual workarounds and ad-hoc requests. These exception-heavy SKUs are often legacy variants or low-volume regional additions never flagged for review. Identifying them is the fastest path to measurable simplification.
4. Nobody can confidently state the current master file count
If the team responsible for artwork execution cannot quickly answer how many active masters the portfolio requires, that signals accumulated complexity. Master file counts grow silently as variants, localizations, and one-off exceptions stack up.
5. New variant requests are approved without portfolio context
When a new SKU request is evaluated only on its own merit, without reference to the total portfolio impact on artwork, production, and data, the approval process is actively contributing to proliferation. Every approval that lacks portfolio context adds complexity that someone else will have to manage downstream.
A Simple Self-Check Before Approving the Next SKU
Before signing off on a new variant, run it through these five questions.
- Does this variant require a new artwork master, or can it use an existing template? If a new master is needed, factor in ongoing maintenance cost, not just initial creation.
- What is the projected volume, and does it justify a dedicated production specification? Low-volume variants carry higher per-unit cost in artwork management and production coordination.
- Which existing SKU is closest to this request, and why is it insufficient? If the answer is vague, the variant may be a duplication.
- Who will own the ongoing artwork updates, approvals, and compliance checks? If the answer is "the same team," check whether that team has capacity.
- Is there a planned review date for this variant? Without a review mechanism, every new SKU becomes permanent by default.
These questions create a pause that connects individual decisions to portfolio-level consequences.
Where to Start if the Answers Raise Concerns
If your self-check reveals gaps, you are not alone. Most FMCG brand owners discover that their portfolio has outgrown its governance structure only when symptoms become impossible to ignore: rising artwork costs, longer approval cycles, or compliance near-misses.
The starting point is visibility. You need an evidence-based map of where complexity concentrates across design, commercial, artwork, and data layers. That map shows which variants are earning their place and which generate cost without returning value.
From there, the work involves setting clear approval criteria, aligning naming conventions and production data, and establishing regular review cycles that keep the structure in step with the business.
Collabra's Packaging Complexity Audit gives brand owners exactly this starting point: a structured assessment of where complexity accumulates and a practical framework for reducing it. If these warning signs feel familiar, a conversation about your portfolio is a productive next step.
