Uneeda Biscuit: The First Consumer Package?

Abstract

This article describes the development of the Uneeda Biscuit package, created in 1899, and the claim that it was the first consumer package. The package represents an important change in the way products were sold. The technical and 7narketing innovation of this package demonstrates a major cultural shift to packaged consumer goods and shelf-stable food—the package was a necessary component in the self-service national distribution retail era that was to follow. The claim that Uneeda Biscuit employed the first consumer package can be refuted on some specific grounds—glass bottles have been used as distinctive consumer unit packages since the 1700s; canned food dates from the mid 1800s; and consumer packages for toilet paper preceded the Uneeda box by 20 years. Nonetheless, Uneeda played an important role in the development of the paperboard box industry, which has been a necessary component of twentieth-century retailing.