📦 We're Hiring: Packaging Manager
📍 Location: United Arab Emirates (Remote)
🕒 Employment Type: Full-Time
💼 Experience Level: Mid-Level to Senior-Level
🌐 Work Arrangement: Fully Remote
About Us
We are a product, operations, and supply-chain focused organization committed to delivering safe, efficient, sustainable, cost-effective, and customer-focused packaging solutions.
Our teams collaborate across Packaging, Product Development, Manufacturing, Procurement, Quality, Supply Chain, Logistics, Marketing, Sustainability, Engineering, and Finance to optimize packaging design, materials, performance, cost, compliance, and sustainability.
The Role
We are seeking an experienced Packaging Manager to lead packaging development, engineering, procurement coordination, quality, cost optimization, sustainability, testing, and continuous improvement across our product portfolio.
The successful candidate will manage packaging specifications and development projects, optimize packaging materials and formats, ensure product protection and regulatory compliance, reduce packaging costs and waste, and collaborate with suppliers and internal stakeholders to deliver high-quality packaging solutions.
Key Responsibilities
- Lead and manage the organization's packaging function.
- Develop and implement packaging strategies aligned with product, commercial, operational, cost, and sustainability objectives.
- Establish packaging standards, specifications, processes, and governance.
- Manage packaging development from concept through commercialization and ongoing optimization.
- Partner with Product Development, R&D, Engineering, Manufacturing, Procurement, Quality, Supply Chain, Logistics, Marketing, Sustainability, and Finance.
- Develop packaging requirements for new and existing products.
- Translate product, customer, distribution, and operational requirements into packaging specifications.
- Evaluate primary, secondary, and tertiary packaging requirements.
- Develop packaging concepts that protect products throughout manufacturing, storage, transportation, distribution, retail, and customer use.
- Review packaging designs, drawings, specifications, prototypes, samples, and technical documentation.
- Optimize packaging dimensions, materials, structures, closures, labels, inserts, protective components, and presentation.
- Balance product protection, aesthetics, functionality, cost, sustainability, and manufacturability.
- Conduct packaging feasibility assessments.
- Evaluate packaging concepts against production capabilities and supply-chain requirements.
- Identify technical risks and develop mitigation strategies.
- Lead packaging development projects from initial concept through testing, validation, production launch, and post-launch optimization.
- Develop packaging project plans, milestones, budgets, resources, and deliverables.
- Coordinate packaging trials and pilot runs.
- Manage packaging-development timelines and escalate risks or delays.
- Ensure packaging projects meet launch requirements.
- Establish packaging specifications and technical standards.
- Maintain packaging bills of materials and component specifications.
- Define material grades, dimensions, tolerances, weights, finishes, colors, printing requirements, closures, adhesives, coatings, and performance criteria as applicable.
- Maintain accurate packaging master data.
- Ensure packaging specifications remain current and controlled.
- Manage packaging artwork and technical information where applicable.
- Coordinate with Marketing, Design, Regulatory, Quality, and suppliers on packaging artwork requirements.
- Ensure packaging information is accurate and compliant.
- Review packaging labels, markings, barcodes, product information, handling symbols, and regulatory statements as applicable.
- Coordinate packaging testing and validation.
- Develop packaging test protocols and acceptance criteria.
- Conduct or coordinate compression, drop, vibration, impact, seal, burst, leak, moisture, temperature, shelf-life, transportation, and other applicable tests.
- Evaluate packaging performance under real-world distribution conditions.
- Conduct transportation and distribution testing.
- Identify packaging failures and root causes.
- Develop corrective actions and redesigns where necessary.
- Validate packaging changes before production release.
- Coordinate laboratory testing and external certification where required.
- Work with Quality and suppliers to ensure packaging materials meet approved specifications.
- Establish packaging quality standards and inspection criteria.
- Develop incoming-quality requirements for packaging components.
- Monitor supplier packaging quality.
- Investigate packaging defects, complaints, and non-conformities.
- Lead root-cause analysis of packaging failures.
- Implement corrective and preventive actions.
- Monitor packaging-related customer complaints and returns.
- Identify recurring packaging quality issues.
- Develop improvement programs to reduce packaging defects.
- Establish supplier-quality requirements.
- Support packaging supplier qualification and approval.
- Evaluate packaging suppliers based on quality, cost, capacity, technology, sustainability, service, and reliability.
- Work with Procurement to source packaging materials and components.
- Review supplier quotations and technical proposals.
- Participate in supplier negotiations and commercial evaluations.
- Develop technical specifications for packaging RFQs.
- Support supplier selection and development.
- Monitor supplier performance against agreed requirements.
- Establish supplier KPIs for quality, delivery, responsiveness, cost, and innovation.
- Conduct supplier audits where appropriate.
- Develop supplier improvement plans for recurring performance issues.
- Identify alternative packaging suppliers and materials to mitigate supply risk.
- Maintain appropriate packaging-supply continuity strategies.
- Analyze packaging costs.
- Establish packaging cost models and benchmarks.
- Monitor material costs, conversion costs, tooling costs, printing costs, logistics costs, and total packaging cost.
- Identify cost-reduction opportunities.
- Optimize packaging material usage without compromising product protection or quality.
- Reduce unnecessary packaging components.
- Optimize package dimensions and material thickness.
- Reduce packaging weight and volume.
- Evaluate alternative materials and suppliers.
- Conduct value-engineering initiatives.
- Develop packaging cost-reduction business cases.
- Partner with Finance to validate packaging savings.
Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)
Performance will be measured through a combination of technical, commercial, operational, quality, supply-chain, and sustainability KPIs, including:
- Packaging cost per unit
- Packaging-cost reduction
- Material-cost savings
- Packaging material usage
- Packaging weight reduction
- Packaging-volume reduction
- Packaging waste reduction
- Packaging defect rate
- Packaging-related customer complaints
- Supplier quality performance
- Supplier on-time delivery
- Packaging-development project completion
- New-product packaging launch readiness
- Packaging testing pass rate
- First-time approval rate
- Packaging-line efficiency
- Packaging-line downtime
- Packaging changeover time
- Packaging OEE
- Material yield
- Packaging inventory levels
- Obsolete packaging reduction
- Transportation-cost reduction
- Pallet/container utilization
- Recycled-content percentage
- Recyclable-packaging percentage
- Packaging carbon-footprint reduction
- Sustainability-project completion
- Packaging compliance
- Packaging-change implementation time
Candidate Profile
The successful candidate should have experience in packaging development, packaging engineering, manufacturing, product development, supply chain, consumer goods, industrial products, food and beverage, pharmaceuticals, retail, or a closely related discipline.
This role is suitable for a technically strong and commercially minded professional who can balance packaging performance, cost, manufacturability, sustainability, regulatory requirements, and customer experience.
What You'll Bring
- Proven experience managing packaging development and optimization.
- Strong knowledge of packaging materials, structures, formats, and manufacturing processes.
- Experience with primary, secondary, and tertiary packaging.
- Strong understanding of packaging testing and validation.
- Experience developing packaging specifications and technical documentation.
- Knowledge of packaging quality standards and inspection requirements.
- Experience managing packaging suppliers and technical sourcing activities.
- Strong understanding of packaging cost drivers and value engineering.
- Experience with packaging cost reduction and material optimization.
- Knowledge of logistics, palletization, warehousing, and transportation requirements.
- Experience supporting manufacturing and packaging-line operations.
- Strong understanding of packaging equipment and production processes.
- Experience with Lean, Six Sigma, Kaizen, or continuous-improvement methodologies is advantageous.
- Experience with sustainable and recyclable packaging solutions is highly desirable.
- Knowledge of packaging legislation and environmental requirements is advantageous.
- Experience with packaging design, CAD, 3D modeling, or digital prototyping is advantageous.
- Strong project-management capabilities.
- Strong analytical and problem-solving skills.
- Advanced Microsoft Excel skills.
- Experience with ERP, PLM, packaging-management, or product-lifecycle systems is advantageous.
- Strong supplier-management and negotiation capabilities.
- Excellent communication and stakeholder-management skills.
- Strong cross-functional leadership capabilities.
- Ability to work independently and effectively within a fully remote environment.
- Relevant degree in Packaging Engineering, Materials Science, Chemical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Industrial Engineering, Product Development, Manufacturing, or a related discipline.
- Professional packaging certification is advantageous.
- Knowledge of UAE/GCC market, regulatory, manufacturing, and supply-chain requirements is advantageous.
- Arabic language proficiency is advantageous.