Tazo Tea: Plantable Packaging for Urban Reforestation

SPECULATIVE DESIGN | SUSTAINABLE PACKAGING | BRANDING | GRAPHIC DESIGN | MATERIAL EXPLORATION

Project Overview

Tazo’s brand voice is bold and community-driven, but their packaging didn’t reflect that. This speculative redesign aimed to align their visual identity with the values they champion — reforestation, climate action, and community healing — through a packaging concept that’s biodegradable, memorable, and easy to reproduce.

Project Details

Goal

Create a cohesive packaging series for a new Tazo product line, aligned with their Tree Corps initiative, that highlights their collaboration with American Forests to plant trees in underserved urban areas.

Timeline

Oct, 2021 – Dec, 2021

Deliverables

Packaging series of three
Competitor Profiling
Moodboard & style guide
Physical & digital mockups

Target Audience

Eco-conscious consumers and loyal Tazo tea drinkers looking for purpose-driven, sustainable products.

Process

Brand & Communication Audit
Concept Direction
Packaging Approach
Graphic Exploration
Material Shift & Design Adaptation
Visual Refinement
Final Design System
Lessons Learned

Introduction

Tazo Tea collaborates with American Forests to support BIPOC communities through initiatives like the Tree Corps—a program that trains and employs individuals to plant and care for trees in urban areas. While this reflects a strong commitment to climate and social action, that impact isn’t immediately visible on the shelf—a missed opportunity.

This speculative packaging redesign bridges that disconnect by transforming the tea box into a compostable container made from wildflower seed paper. Rather than discarding it, users are invited to plant it—creating small-scale ecological moments that echo Tazo’s broader mission.

The result is packaging that doesn’t just avoid waste—it becomes a conversation starter, a gesture toward environmental care, and a reflection of the values already rooted in Tazo’s brand.

What if tea packaging didn’t end up in the trash—but became part of something new?

1. Brand & Communication Audit

Tazo positions itself as a brand fighting for climate justice and social equity. Their messaging highlights partnerships with groups like American Forests, BIPOC communities, and a wide range of well-being-centered products. However, the packaging at the time didn’t reflect that mission — a disconnect between the visual identity and brand intent.

Key Observations

Emphasis on emotive names (Calm, Awake, Energize)
Advocacy-forward language, e.g., “Fight for climate justice”
Heavy reliance on online community-building
Lacked packaging that visibly echoed their cause

Competitor Profiling

To understand how Tazo stacked up, I analyzed key competitors: Numi and Stash. While Tazo has the boldest voice, it lacked strong packaging that felt tactile, personal, and purpose-driven. The comparison revealed a gap — Tazo’s visual tone didn’t match its mission.

Key Insight: Tazo has the most activist-forward voice, but lacked the tactile, community-rooted feel in its product experience — a design opportunity.

2. Concept Direction

Inspired by Tazo’s Tree Corps collaboration, I selected three of the five cities featured in their campaign: Detroit, Minneapolis, and the San Francisco Bay Area. These cities represent not just geography, but cultural and economic diversity, and each carries a rich story of urban regrowth.

Rooted in Place

Each city label was anchored by a distinct architectural landmark, chosen for its ability to capture the spirit and identity of the region. These structures weren’t just buildings — they served as visual symbols of place:

Detroit → Ally Detroit Center
A powerful emblem of the city’s industrial legacy and resurgence.
Minneapolis → CenturyLink Building
Sleek and modern, echoing the city’s progressive tone and quiet strength.
Bay Area → Transamerica Pyramid
Iconic and instantly recognizable — a reflection of the region’s innovation and cultural influence.

To deepen the regional story, each city was also paired with a flavor tied to local character or agricultural roots:

Detroit → Tart Cherry Black Tea
A nod to Michigan’s renowned cherry crops and Detroit’s bold, grounded energy.
Minneapolis → Peach Green Tea
Light and crisp, mirroring Minnesota’s natural calm and warm simplicity.
Bay Area → Pomegranate Hibiscus Herbal Tea
Bright, layered, and vibrant — reflecting the Bay’s dynamic, diverse spirit.

By aligning architecture and flavor, each box became a multi-sensory expression of place, tying together design, geography, and taste.

3. Packaging Approach

This packaging concept was designed to be interactive, purposeful, and rooted in regeneration. Each box would be printed on wildflower seed paper, encouraging users to plant it in a small pot on their porch or windowsill after use, transforming waste into something living.

To align with this goal, the design was tailored for Riso printing, a method that uses soy-based inks (non-toxic) and produces minimal waste. While most tea packaging relies on conventional, glossy finishes and mass-produced materials, this approach emphasized low-impact production and tactile simplicity — a missed opportunity among many competitors in the space.

The final direction prioritized:

1. Plantable materials with a second life

2. Riso-friendly graphics and limited color use

3. A compostable, non-toxic end product

As a result, the packaging would reflect Tazo’s mission of renewal, turning a single-use product into a small but tangible act of regeneration.

The color system was intentionally limited to accommodate both the constraints of Riso printing and the texture of wildflower seed paper. Using just three inks — red, blue, and black — the palette remained resource-efficient while allowing for a wide range of visual effects. Purple was created by overlapping red and blue, a technique that expands the palette without requiring an additional pass through the printer. Each color was chosen for its contrast and legibility on the biodegradable, textured surface.

4. Graphic Exploration

Knowing the constraints of Riso’s single-color-per-pass process — and aiming to minimize resource use — the graphic style was intentionally pared down to include just enough detail to convey meaning. Each building was simplified for clarity, while roots extended from the base — a visual that carried both literal and symbolic weight, referencing Tazo’s urban tree-planting initiative and the deeper idea of reconnecting with place.

Each building was simplified into a bold, recognizable silhouette. Root systems were added as a grounding visual and a nod to Tazo’s tree-planting mission.

5. Material Shift & Design Adaptation

While the graphic exploration phase was underway, early tests began to see if the design could be printed on wildflower seed paper using Riso’s soy-based inks — a fully compostable, plantable approach. But it quickly became clear that Riso couldn’t reliably feed the textured seed paper, prompting a major pivot.

To preserve the reuse-centered concept, the design evolved to incorporate some type of die-cut design, allowing the seed paper to show through from behind. Rather than compromise, this solution turned the limitation into a feature — placing the material itself at the forefront of the packaging.

Material exploration during the design pivot. Left: Loose tea used as a texture reference and visual motif. Right: Testing out different ways to use the wildflower seed paper — an adaptation after Riso printing proved incompatible.

5. Visual Refinement

With the design system finalized, semi-final layouts were tested using black-and-white miniatures. While the final design was always intended to be full color, lo-fi mockups were a valuable tool for evaluating layout, form, and legibility. Seeing the labels physically wrap around containers helped validate the structural logic before moving into production-ready templates.

7. Final Design System

With the new direction locked in, the final packaging system struck a balance between simplicity, symbolism, and reusability. Each label featured:

A distinct architectural silhouette representing one of the three cities
A bold color story tied to each regional flavor — red, blue, and purple — chosen not only for clarity and contrast, but also for efficient two-color Riso printing.
Die-cut windows reveal the wildflower seed paper beneath
Subtle tea leaf textures enhance the organic, plant-based identity

The result — a unified series of three — visually rich yet resource-conscious and conceptually layered.

Lessons Learned

The original plan was ambitious: soy-based Riso printing on wildflower seed paper, allowing the packaging to be planted after use. But technical constraints—both with the printer and the paper—forced a shift.

These limitations required a reevaluation of materials and execution. Instead of abandoning the concept entirely, the design evolved. A die-cut solution was introduced, allowing the seed paper to show through selectively. Additionally, tea leaf textures were incorporated into the box design to maintain a natural, earthy tone.

While the outcome didn’t fully match the original vision, it stayed grounded in the same values: reuse, repurpose, and resource-conscious decision-making.

Let’s build something thoughtful.

Have an idea? I’d love to hear from you.

SAY HELLO