ON THE CUTTING EDGE: Presents You Can Open
Amazon.com, Sony, Microsoft and Best Buy are looking for alternatives to those impregnable plastic “clamshell” packages that make it impossible to get to the gadget or toy encased inside without using a box cutter, steak knife, screw driver or other improvised tool, reports The New York Times. Amazon.com founder and father of four Jeffrey P. Bezos tells The Times, “I shouldn’t have to start each Christmas morning with a needle nose pliers and wire cutters. But that is what I do, I arm myself, and it still takes me 10 minutes to open each package.”
As a result, Bezos launched a pilot program with Mattel, Microsoft and electronics maker Transcend to use “frustration-free packaging” - good, old-fashioned cardboard boxes. Separately, Microsoft has also begun to encase the Explorer computer mice it sells at Best Buy in a plastic container that “unzips.” For its part, Sony is experimenting with packaging that uses an adhesive that easily pulls apart, but makes a Velcro-like noise to discourage theft.
According to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, attempts to open clamshells result in 6,000 ER visits annually.
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