Packaging Sustainability Lead

Key Responsibilities

• Provide hands-on technical expertise in packaging materials, structures and specifications to assess sustainability solutions for application across the supply chain. 
• Lead technical decisions and clearly articulate implications to stakeholders. 
• Assess how emerging legislation materially changes packaging design, specifications or formats, and lead necessary technical or specification responses.
• Lead a cross functional team to define the technical success criteria, testing protocols and validation requirements for new sustainable materials and formats. 
• Act as a technical escalation point for complex sustainability-led packaging questions.
• Work cross functionally to identify future tools or systems to enable efficient data gathering and reporting and own delivery of these tools. 
• Drive the adoption of Design for Compliance approaches and tools. 

• Apply change management principles to secure buy‑in, align functions, and turn sustainability recommendations into decisions and action.
• Drive the implementation of sustainability best practices throughout the Twinings business 
• Work with cross functional teams (example, Procurement) to maintain, update and monitor dashboards. Where necessary implement systems or tracking to enable accurate reporting on progress towards targets. 
• Represent Packaging function where required in Sustainability platforms and committees, e.g., TwO Environmental Due Diligence, Twinings Environmental Working group. Create clear recommendations to enable senior stakeholders to make informed decisions. 
• In collaboration with Regulatory team, enable marketing teams to ensure that our consumers are educated and informed to allow correct disposal of packaging materials. 
• Provide regular business updates to stakeholders to communicate trends, industry updates and insight into the wider sustainable packaging landscape. 
• Work closely with Ovo to ensure that common challenges are shared and that alignment is gained on interpretation of legislation to ensure common approaches are adopted where this is appropriate to do so. Ensure recyclability definitions and data is presented in a consistent manner. 
• Develop an external expert panel and work with ABF sustainability teams to share knowledge and learn. 
• Evaluate external accreditations for future adoption and make recommendations to the business 

• Develop and own a prioritised packaging roadmap—aligned to commitment on net zero and circularity, market trends, legislation updates and material specifications—driving a defined portfolio of changes through qualification and implementation to keep Twinings fit for the future.
• Lead and drive, via a programme management approach, cross-functional alignment between Procurement, Pack Engineering, Regulatory and Manufacturing teams to ensure that the roadmap is translated into tangible actions, with defined owners and timings, to deliver change.
• Accountable for turning sustainability strategy into implemented change in markets, ensuring initiatives are delivered on time and against defined success criteria. 

• Partner Procurement by identifying, scoping out and making recommendations on specification changes that align with net zero ambitions and take ownership for ensuring the business has clarity on carbon impact from these opportunities. 
• Define milestones to enable monitoring of progress towards published targets 
• Ensure carbon, compliance and operational impacts are quantified and agreed prior to decision-making.

• Support with the Monitoring and interpreting of evolving sustainability legislation, including but not limited to PPWR, EUDR, Net zero requirements.
• Assess the impact of regulations on packaging design, supply chain, and production and lead the communication of these requirements to the relevant stakeholders. 
• Own & Lead the development of a packaging Sustainability Compliance roadmap and work with all relevant functions to implement the changes.  Ensure regular review so this remains fit for purpose. 
• Conduct horizon scanning in collaboration with Procurement teams, to 1) evaluate next steps for packaging categories and 2) ensure that future packaging initiatives are fit for purpose and mitigate against legislative and taxation risks. 

• Partner with Supply Chain teams and suppliers to research new materials, clarify complexity, provide cost analysis and risk assessments to allow recommendations to be built. 
• Lead Production and Pack Engineering team to ensure rationale for change is understood and to remove potential barriers for successful deployment. Ensure alignment is gained to agree testing plans, qualification timelines and own end to end delivery against agreed success criteria.  
• Close collaboration with Packaging Exploration Lead to ensure that future packaging materials and specifications are in line with sustainability requirements. This will involve assessment of data, trends and legislation in order to present the most appropriate solutions to the business to enable sustainable growth.  
• Identify opportunities for cost reduction of materials, in line with sustainability requirements, and ensure that these are fed into the action pipeline 
• Technology Scouting: Collaborate with Procurement to identify new suppliers or harness new technologies to drive the packaging sustainability agenda forward. Ensuring that our supply base is fit for future sustainability demands. 
• Provide technical assessment of new materials to Procurement teams to inform and build increased understanding. 

Skills, Knowledge and Expertise

• FMCG change management background with the ability to understand barriers to change, influencing skills to unlock these barriers and comfortable operating in ambiguity. 
• Proven track record in successful implementation of packaging sustainability projects from testing to qualification and then launch. 
• Experience working with innovative and complex packaging solutions and future material development, including compostability requirements
• Extensive network and access to industry expertise in order to learn and inform
• Demonstrated ability to operate as a technical subject matter expert to influence without authority. 
• Deep knowledge of packaging sustainability legislation, circular economy principles, and net-zero strategies.
• Strong analytical and evaluation skills with the ability to assess regulatory requirements from a technical packaging perspective and understand complex scenarios to provide clarity on necessary actions and decisions. 
• Problem solving skills to understand, unlock and then communicate complex issues to allow fit for purpose solutions to be implemented. 
• Exceptional communication and stakeholder management with the ability to engage, confidently challenge and build connectivity across disparate teams to enable decisions. 
• Exceptional influencing skills to achieve alignment across functions and drive decisions towards tangible delivery
• Ability to work under pressure, managing multiple projects and driving delivery within fixed timelines.

Benefits

• Subsidized meals in local canteen
• Two additional, fully paid days off over the Festive period 
• Discounted online Twinings tea shop 
• Welcome pack for newborn Twinings babies 
• Co-financed MultiSport card
• Co-financed kindergarten
• Discounts for sport, education and travels
• Vouchers for Christmas
• Holiday bonus 
• Comprehensive wellbeing program
• Vouchers for beauty treatments 
• Onsite beauty treatments
• Twice yearly parties for the whole team