Packaging
that sticks.
Over twenty years making brands stand out on shelf — for General Mills, Coca‑Cola, Hershey’s, Kraft Heinz, Nestlé and the retailers that stock them.
Now working directly with the brands that want that experience without the agency around it.
Brands I’ve designed for
Over twenty years of packaging design, agency-side and in-house, on the shelf sets you already know.
Strategy first, then the pretty part.
Design that isn’t rooted in what the shopper actually does is just decoration. Every project starts with the category, the competition and the person reaching for the shelf.
Packaging design
Cartons, film, labels, rigid. New brands, redesigns, line extensions — from first sketch to final production files.
Brand identity
Logos, guidelines, naming, full refreshes. Usually for brands who need packaging next, so the two are built to fit.
Strategy & insight
Competitive audits, category reviews, consumer research folded into the brief — so the design is answering a real question.
Range & system work
Architecture across dozens or hundreds of SKUs, so a line reads as one family and stays that way as it grows.
Art direction
Photography and image direction for packaging, campaigns and sell-in — briefing shooters and steering the look.
Marketing & trade
Sell sheets, trade show design, marketing materials, brand guideline documents that teams actually follow.
Give me the whole line, not one box.
My best work has always been programs — at Topco I ran a packaging update across multiple grocery chains and hundreds of SKUs. That’s the work I’m built for: big ranges, long relationships, a system that holds together across every SKU in it.
One-off projects are fine. Ongoing is better — for both of us. The second year of a relationship is always the good one.
Mindy Syster
I’m a Creative Director and packaging designer with over twenty years of helping global brands stand out on shelf. My work spans consumer packaging, brand identity, logo design and photography art direction — always rooted in strategy, consumer insight, and a deep curiosity about why people reach for one thing and not another. Production knowledge is the edge underneath all of it: knowing how ink, substrate and structure drive cost, and what actually survives a press run.
From first concept sketches to final production files, I bring creative vision and strategic thinking to every stage. I like solving the complicated ones — the brief with a contradiction in it, the range that has drifted apart, the category where everything looks the same.
And I’m good company. You can count on fresh ideas, straight answers and someone who actually enjoys this.
Projects
[ OVER TWENTY YEARS, ON SHELF ]Packaging and brand identity I’ve designed for the brands below — agency-side and in-house. Happy to walk you through my role on any single piece.
Tell me what you’re working on.
A launch, a range that needs pulling back together, or a line that’s costing more than it should. First conversation is free and I’ll tell you straight whether I’m the right person for it.