The show (February 25-26) celebrates its 10th anniversary this year combining three events; Packaging Innovations, Empack and Label&Print.
'We are lucky to have a complete market share in India'
Alison Church, event director, Packaging Portfolio, easyFairs UK, said it has seen a massive growth in label and print which is having a huge impact on packaging design and the industry will ‘never print the same job twice in 2015’ as companies change their packaging at least twice.
Talking about developing markets, Janet Shipton, packaging lead chocolate, R&D global packaging, Mondelēz, said its brands account for 19% market share in North America, 37% in Europe and 44% in developing markets.
“We currently have chocolate in Brazil and India but we are looking to develop our brands into more ‘white space areas’. We are lucky to have a complete market share in India. We are very established there. The brand name Cadbury’s is like ‘Hoover’ there,” she said.
“We get involved in projects all over the world and we have 350 employees in our packaging development team who work across different markets.
“We have ‘regional jewels’ such as Côte d'Or chocolate in France and Alpen Gold in Russia, these brands are strong in their particular regions but they don’t cross as well into other regions.”
£75m planned investment for Bournville centre of excellence
Shipton said the company employs 5,500 people worldwide and its centre of excellence is based in Bournville, UK.
“We are very lucky to have our centre of excellence in the UK as there were a lot of discussions about that and there is a £75m planned investment for the site,” she said.
Speaking about ‘Investing in Future Packaging Talent’, Shipton added there are programmes in place at the company to invest in future talent including its technical academy, apprenticeship programme and an industrial placement where five students from the UK, France and Germany will join the firm next month for one year to work on a ‘real life’ project with the global packaging team.
“We are very positive abut how we invest in future packaging talent, I’ve worked in the industry for over 24 years, I remember fondly my early jobs and the people who were instrumental in my career and learning things that helped me to progress,” she said.
“Packaging is a journey and it’s a cyclical thing. We want to make sure the right people can move around the company and take part in various short term assignments, in a different region or different category.
“We want our employees to be able to cross categories, moving from chocolate to biscuits or cross functional departments; going from procurement, product development or into the supply chain so they become an all-rounded person with various skills and an appreciation of all the roles within the company.”