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Great results for the Spanish packaging sector at the WorldStar Awards, the most important international packaging competition. A total of twelve Líderpack winners, supported by Fira de Barcelona’s Hispack trade show and the Graphispack Association, represented Spain in this international competition and won an award. The winners are: the PET bottle for Vichy Catalán mineral water; a cardboard box for champagne that can be turned into an ice bucket; a rum bottle; a container for surgical waste; a premium olive oil bottle; a lined box for the new collection of Carolina Herrera fragrances; a handbag-sized perfume spray with a wooden case; a box for distributing fruit; a bag that extends the useful life of vegetables; a process for simplifying the manufacture of packaging with a window to see what’s inside; a box that can be adapted to different TV decoders, and packaging for logistics use.

A total of 291 entries from 35 countries took part in this edition of the WorldStar Awards, of which 195 won a prize in the categories of beverages, food, health and beauty, medical and pharmaceutical, household, electronics, point of sale, logistics and other segments.

Spain shared fifth position with the United Kingdom on the ranking of WorldStar 2017 awards, behind Germany and Japan (20), China (16) and the United States (15). The prize-giving ceremony will be held in Düsseldorf (Germany) in May 2017 during the Interpack trade show.

The WorldStar Awards, organised by the World Packaging Organisation (WPO), features entries that have already won an award in their country of origin, which in the case of Spain are the Líderpack Awards convened every year by Fira de Barcelona’s Hispack trade show and the Graphispack Association. The jury decides whether a product is worthy of a WorldStar award by comparing it with other packaging in the same category.

Three of the Spanish award-winners were in the Beverages category; the 1.2 litre Vichy Catalán mineral water bottle made from multilayer PET, with a more ergonomic and manageable design that includes an engraving of a Gaudí mosaic; a box manufactured by Grupo Miralles for GH Mumm champagne that can be turned into a water-resistant ice bucket, and the colourful bottle for Barceló Añejo rum lined with a flexography-printed sleeve, created by Madrid-based firm Overlar.

In the food packaging category there were two winners for packaging that helps to reduce food wastage, one of the priority objectives for the WPO in the short-term that will drive innovations in the packaging industry. In this category the winners were packaging for the home delivery of fruit by Saicapack and a Doypack bag by Murcian firm Flexomed, which absorbs ethylene from fruit and vegetables and hence extends their useful life.

In the Premium packaging category, the bottle for the limited edition gourmet olive oil ‘Legado’ won a WorldStar award, designed by the Cordoba-based agency Al Margen Comunicación, along with the straight-edged, cardboard-lined box for CH Confidential & Pure Oil manufactured by Fabregas Packaging.

Meanwhile, DS Smith Flak won a WorldStar award in the categories of logistics and electronics respectively for its products ‘Octabin’, a large-scale octagonal container with a lid made from 100% recyclable cardboard that can be assembled in 15 seconds, and a box for TV decoders that can be adapted by dropdown flaps to different models.

In the medical and pharmaceutical section the winner was a sustainable container for surgical waste, manufactured by PFP Termopolímeros, which improves the waste collection process as well as saving costs; while in the health and beauty category the winning project was the Geometric Wooden Purse Spray, an aerosol with a wooden casing developed by the Hospitalet de Llobregat firm Quadpack.

The list of Spanish winners was rounded off by the Girona-based firm Comexi for its innovative process for simplifying the manufacturing stages of freestanding packaging with a window for viewing the contents.

The general secretary of the Graphispack Association, Ignasi Cusí – who took part in the jury meeting held recently in Vienna –
extolled the design, quality and innovation of Spanish packaging products and their excellent international positioning. “The great results that the Líderpack winners tend to achieve every year at the WorldStar Awards demonstrate the ongoing efforts made by the Spanish packaging industry to innovate and adapt to market trends and the needs of the various demand sectors,” explains Cusí.