Packaging Designer
Nex is on a mission to help families rediscover the joy of movement. Created by parents for parents, Nex combines technology and play to deliver fun, social, and interactive experiences powered by natural body motion, encouraging kids and adults to move more, play more, and have fun together. Nex Playground, the company’s award-winning active play system, is purpose-built to get families moving year-round, with safety and privacy as core considerations in its intentional design. It is certified kidSAFE+ COPPA compliant and built to support healthy, active play for all ages and abilities.
Nex Playground features a growing library of 50+ experiences, including motion and dance games, fitness and educational experiences, and Nex Originals. Content includes collaborations with partners like Hasbro, Sesame Workshop, and NBCUniversal. Nex has been recognized by Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies, TIME’s Best Inventions, and Parents’ Best Entertainment System for Families, and has earned Red Dot, IDEA, and Core77 international design awards. We encourage you to explore Have Fun and Is Motion Gaming Back?, as they offer a deeper look into our culture, values, and explain how our approach to motion gaming differs from previous generations.
Location: Remote (USA only) with some office travel required
Annual salary: USD 95,000 - USD 115,000
Type: Full Time
The Role
We’re looking for a Packaging Designer who cares deeply about how products show up in the real world. This role sits at the intersection of brand, industrial design, and storytelling, owning the end-to-end design of packaging that feels as intentional, delightful, and differentiated as the product inside.
You’ll help define how our brand lives on shelves, in homes, and in the hands of customers. This is not about making things simply look “nice” and instead about creating packaging that earns attention, communicates clearly, and delivers a memorable unboxing experience.
What You'll Do
- Design and execute packaging from initial prototypes to mass production using sustainable materials
- Define the unboxing experience from purchase to setup, creating a seamless physical-to-digital flow
- Drive innovation by exploring new approaches to form, function, construction, and materials across Nex’s full suite of products
- Shape the structural language of our brand—considering materials, construction, tone, and print
- Uncover unboxing insights and test concepts against core product goals
- Develop elegant solutions for technical challenges and complex shipping requirements with a high degree of strong visual taste
- Use 2D and 3D CAD to design and document all parts and assemblies
- Ensure designs meet performance requirements throughout their lifecycle through materials analysis, stress testing, and failure analysis
- Collaborate with hardware, operations, marketing, and retail teams to refine and execute designs and adhere to business goals
- Build models and prototypes to articulate concepts, evaluate functionality, and validate performance
- Partner with external manufacturing teams to optimize designs for function, aesthetics, manufacturability and flawless delivery against robust test standards
- Communicate clearly and often with cross-functional teams to execute under tight timelines
What You'll Bring
Minimum Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree in Industrial Design, Packaging Design or Graphic Design
- 5+ years of related industry experience
- Strong design or engineering fundamentals
- Hands-on experience exploring and refining designs through iterative prototyping
- Experience in 3D CAD modeling and render packages
- Experience with design cycle from concept to manufacturing in mass-production
- Ability to travel to support successful production of design intent
- Innovative thinking and high personal motivation
- Flexibility and comfort working in a quickly changing environment
- Effective verbal and written presentation skills
Bonus Points
- Experience with consumer electronics, toys, or family-oriented products
- Knowledge of sustainable packaging practices and materials
- Experience designing for retail environments (big box, DTC, or both)
- Comfort supporting adjacent brand or marketing initiatives, when needed
How We Work
- We value taste and craft as much as speed
- We aim for distinctive, not derivative
- We believe packaging is part of the product experience, not an afterthought
- We operate with high ownership and low ego
We Offer
- Competitive compensation package.
- Flexible working hours and vacation policy.
- Product-driven culture that treasures talents and individual growth.
- Front-row seat and hands-on experience with cutting edge technologies in the evolving gaming field
Nex is located in San Jose, California, USA and Hong Kong. Learn more about us at nex.inc/who-we-are.
We encourage applications even if you don’t meet more than 50% of the requirements — we believe that experience comes in many forms!
Nex is an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, gender identity, and sexual orientation), national origin, ancestry, age, physical or mental disability, medical condition, genetic information, marital status, military or veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law. This policy applies to all individuals at every stage of the employment relationship, including all current and prospective employees, and covers all employment decisions including recruitment, hiring, job assignment, promotion, compensation, benefits, training, discipline and termination.
We are committed to providing a workplace free from discrimination and harassment and to fostering an inclusive environment for all employees.