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 Does anyone else notice that most "easy to open" products are rarely easy to open?

 I know some products are actually easy to open but is this used by many companies as just strategic marketing (false advertising)?

 I'm sure all food & medicine companies have to meet certain anti-tampering regulations. And with other companies, it may be poor "easy open" designs, poor materials or poor machining. But regardless of the reason, they still seem to want possible customers to think that their product will be as effortless to open as it will be to consume or use. 

I guess they have nothing to lose by telling us it will be easy to open even if they know it won't be. Perhaps they've done studies that show that most of us just assume we're too stupid to open it the right way.  😄

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To be fair, there are actually quite a few people that can't figure out how to open various products that have been made that way for decades, and if these people watch "TV" or commercials or whatever, they've almost certainly seen someone open them "correctly" multiple times. 

 

I have seen people I work with open soda and water bottles by prying at the cap until it breaks, with a key or even a bottle opener, isntead of just unscrewing it.  Also seen some open them by twisting *the wrong way* until the cap breaks or the bottle does (in the case of thin water bottles).   I've seen people open pulltab cans of various types by using something to rotate the tab around until it can't push on the scored section, then pry the tab up and break it off, and hten use it between two fingers to beat on the scored area of the can top to break that then drink whatever it is thru the tiny sliver of opening they've made.   I've seen ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion.... (just seeing if you're still reading.)

 

There *are* a lot of packages that are poorly designed, and many otherwise well-designed ones are so badly made that they can't be opened.   

One of the most common I run into is the half-ziploc bags, where only half the top is openable, but teh ziploc isn't lined up with this hole, and is sealed into the bag such that it only covers part of the hole. 

Another is the impenatrable foil-and-cardstock seal with plastic under it.  There are tiny <1mm "tabs", often as many as 3, that don't actually stick out beyond the plastic of the jar enough to grab hold of, even with good pliers or wiresnips, much less fingernails or even teeth or a finger pressed along the top of the seal and a knifeedge under the seal edge.   If you instead puncture hte seal with a knife, etc., and pull with that, it just tears a line in the seal.  You must then proceed to disassemble the seal a fingernail-size-piece at a time. Once you get htis done, you realize there is still a plastic membrane covering most of the opening, and it is fused to the jar edge so well that you must run a sharp knife around the edge to cut it off. 

There are the "tear to open" packages where the divots to begin the tear are well above the openable area, well within the heatsealed portion, so this only tears off part of the seal.  Optionally the plastic is the wrong kind and can't be torn, it just stretches.  Or the plastic is a type that always tears in a curve away from the rest of the package toward the top edge, so the tear never reaches the openable section and only takes an inch or two off the completely sealed portion.  Etc.

The pulltop cans (progresso, lookin' at you) where the metal is insuffiicnetly weakened at the score line around the top, so it requires a leverage-inducing prybar of some type to remove the top.  Some quarter of the time, perhaps less, the force required to tear the metal at the score line to open the can exceeds the strenght of the pulltab connection to the lid, sending hte can to the top of your toes and the tab and prybar into your forehead.

I could go on, but....I'm worn out just thinking about having to do all those things again. 

 

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12 hours ago, Amberwolf said:

nd if these people watch "TV" or commercials or whatever,

I haven't watched TV since Jay Leno's first "Tonight" show. The main thing I find hard to open is when something is encased in those sealed, rigid, plastic packs. I have one of those "cuts almost anything" scissors that will take care of that.

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