However, once competition became a vital part of American commerce, packaging began to develop as a means of expanding beyond local markets and informing potential customers as to the identity of the manufacturer. In this way manufacturers were able to assure customers that the product had not been tampered with and that they would be receiving an honest measure.

By taking the problems of cleanliness and accurate measure out of the hands of the retailer, the manufacturer was able to build a widespread reputation and open vast new markets. In 1896 the newly formed National Biscuit Company did just that when it introduced UNEEDA, an improved type of soda cracker, protected by an inner-waxed paper wrap, a folding carton and a colorfully printed overwrap. The new product and packaging quickly won nationwide approval and gave the folding carton industry and enormous push forward.

Actually, the first folding paperboard package to gain widespread use came into existence around 1850. It was a crude, hand-formed box made of paperboard which was used to make market tacks.
Known as a paper of tacks, the packages were tied with string and had a label pasted over one end to show size, weight and manufacturer’s name.

Paperboard boxes were being commercially produced on local level as early as 1839, when Aaron L. Dennison, a Boston jeweler, began making setup jewelry boxes for himself and other area jewelers.

By 1850, Dennison had expanded his line to include mailing boxes, display cards, price tags, and boxes for a wide assortment of small products including combs, keys, spectacles, pencils and hairpins. Within ten years, others noting Dennison’s success established their own box-making plants and began developing machinery to speed production and reduce costs.

During the next twenty years the box manufacturers introduced a wide variety of folding cartons which, unlike the earlier boxes produced by Dennison, could be shipped flat and easily set up by the user. Laminating machines were developed to allow the bonding of high-quality paper to cheaper paperboard. This in turn encouraged the printing of colorful design and advertising messages on the cartons.

In 1879, a mistake by a careless pressman in Robert Gair’s box plant paved the way to truly inexpensive, mass produced carton manufacturing.

The pressman, running an order of seed bags, failed to notice that the printing plates were neatly cutting through the paper as a result of poor make-ready. Fortunately, the ruined press run gave Gair a great idea. He developed special steel rules; locked them in a form; put them on a platen press; and, in a single operation, began cutting and creasing folding carton blanks.

Gair’s idea brought about the first really inexpensive, machine-made cartons and signaled the beginning of the industry as we now know it.