The Industry Packaging Professional of the Year Award is designed to recognise and acknowledge the outstanding achievements and contribution by an individual currently working within the Packaging in both Australia and New Zealand.
The judges were looking for individuals who have demonstrated vision and leadership, shows innovation and not afraid to take risks over a long and sustained period. Selected from a strong field of finalists, the 2024 Industry Packaging Professional of the Year is Bryan McKay, head of packaging at Woolworths Group.
About the winner:
Bryan McKay has been at the forefront of packaging innovation and sustainability in the FMCG and retail industry for 30 years, having led the packaging development teams at Campbells/Arnott's Asia Pacific, Cerebos Foods ANZ, Goodman Fielder ANZ, and most recently at Woolworths Food Company (WFC).
At Campbell/Arnott's McKay developed and delivered the Asia Pacific Packaging Sustainability Strategic Plan and led the packaging team to some significant achievements, including the conversion of biscuit trays from non-recyclable polystyrene to recyclable PET back in 2008 (this was trailblazing, many companies are now on this journey, 16 years later).
Another achievement was the development of the Arnott's Indonesia modified atmosphere biscuit packaging with ultra high barrier for export; a first for Campbell/Arnott’s globally.
McKay also co-developed with Campbell's Engineering an aseptic PET juice strategy.
He was the packaging lead for the innovative ‘MasterFoods Squeeze-On’ tomato sauce portion pack, which was an Australian first pack that revolutionised the portion control sauces market, taking Masterfoods from no presence in this category to dominating the category within two years.
While at Goodman Fielder ANZ, McKay led the replacement of polystyrene bread tags with cardboard bread tags in 2021, the inclusion of 100 per cent rPET into Praise Mayonnaise bottles and jars - a category first, and in 2021 the implementation of 30 per cent rHDPE into Meadow fresh milk bottles in New Zealand; again, a category and region first.
More recently at WFC, McKay has developed and implemented the WFC packaging Sustainability Strategy, the guiding Roadmap, and the implementation plan.
This has resulted in significant achievements in the past two years including the removal of >14,000 tonnes of virgin plastic, and the conversion of >10,000 tonnes of non-recyclable materials to recyclable. These achievements are industry leading and material to the packaging circular economy.
Under McKay leadership, WFC has applied the Australasian Recycling Label (ARL) on all of its Own Brand products, two years ahead of the 2025 National Packaging targets.
In all of these companies McKay’s strategies delivered category leading, Australian leading and often world leading achievements. This has required innovation, collaboration, influencing (both internally and externally to the organisations McKay worked for) and risk taking.
The AIP is proud to see one of our finest of Fellows become the 2024 Industry Packaging Professional of the Year Award.
