Today’s Popsop guest and speaker is a very bright personality with a multicultural background and broad variety of interests and skills. French-born from Serbian parents, he speaks 5 languages including French, English, Mandarin, Russian and Serbian, holds degree in Applied Maths from prestigious Ecole Centrale de Paris and Management Science degree from Shanghai Jiaotong University. This is the man who dared to take a dive into the China world back in 2001 and launched a successful brand and research ‘laboratory balancing between rationality and creativity’ there. Now Shanghai-based Labbrand, founded and headed by Vladimir Djurovic, is an internationally recognized brand expert with clients such as ClubMed, L’Oréal, P&G, Disney, Volkswagen, IKEA, Gucci Group, Häagen-Dazs, ING, Nestle, TESCO and many others.

American packaging design industry veteran, Ted Mininni of Design Force, considers how the design providers became more ‘left-brained’ and analytical over years, shares the firm’s ‘survival strategy’ for the recessionary times and recommends some good and inspiring read for the U.S. peers.

A world-renowned brand and design expert with the 35-year history, with dozen of international design awards, which has repositioned Glenfiddich three times and Campari and Chivas Regal twice, — this is all about Claessens International. Company’s creative director, James Boulton, shares his vision on some latest trends in packaging design for alcoholic drinks, talks about their experience with Russia and discusses how globalisation influences the drinking culture around the world.

Today’s Popsop interview (the last one this year) is with Darren Foley, Managing Director of Pearlfisher studio in London, a packaging design specialist with fresh approach, unique culture and a long list of happy international clients. We asked Darren about how the UK design industry came through the post-recessionary 2011 year, about overseas opportunities and his vision on what’s to come in 2012.

This week Popsop has interviewed Coley Porter Bell CEO Vicky Bullen, who has led the team to the international recognition amongst clients far beyond the UK, including Russia. She tells about the projects with Pernod Ricard Rouss and Krupskaya Confectionery, discusses overseas opportunities for the UK design businesses and spots how to prevent Creative Britain from going in reverse.

With 951 entries from over 50 countries, this year’s Pentawards competition, the only international one exclusively dedicated to packaging design, has been tough, experts say. We asked Graham Shearsby, Group Creative Director at Design Bridge, award-winning agency which has scooped 4 Pentawards this year, about the award’s retrospective, criteria and the trends, driving the UK package design industry today.

While David Cameron’s visit to Moscow on Monday, 12 September, can hardly be regarded a full ‘reset’ in quite ‘chilly’ UK-Russia political ties, it should definitely have a positive impact on strengthening bilateral business relations between the countries. Talking business without politics, Russia has long been and still is an appealing market for UK companies in some key economic sectors. Taking into account a growing number of Russian companies looking to create and develop strong national brands, and, on the other hand, Britain’s vibrant expertise in branding and design, UK and Russia seem to be ‘uniquely placed to help each other grow’ in this direction, indeed.