As editor of It's fun to note little details about "classic" plastic products, so here's one from The Consumerist blog and Australia's Herald Sun newspaper. Australian winemaker Thomas Angove, who patented the idea for packaging wine in a plastic bag in a box 45 years ago, has died at the age of 92.
Wine packaging has changed in the past few decades, but I imagine that when Angove proposed the bag-in-box, it was a radical idea. After all, wine packaging had been pretty standard for centuries.
Angove's son, John Angove, told the Herald Sun that he remembers being skeptical about his dad's concept.
"I do remember when I was about 15 and he brought home a prototype and I said to him: 'that's ridiculous, nobody is going to buy wine out of a cardboard box and a plastic bag'," he said. "But he persevered, didn't listen to me and he was determined. He had a very broad vision."
A toast to Thomas Angove, an inspiration for all the product designers who think outside the box.