The Fibre Box Association (FBA) announced Walmart’s Jim Thomson as a speaker at the upcoming FBA Annual Meeting set for May 6-8 at the Ocean Reef Club in Key Largo, Florida.
As the Director of Packaging Product Development, Thomson will share Walmart’s approach to packaging and provide an overview and update on the company’s four-year plan to automate distribution centers across the country. Thomson will talk about how automation is impacting packaging that moves through the Walmart system.
Thomson graduated from UW Stout with a double major in packaging and general business administration and has over 20 years of experience in the packaging industry. He started his career at IBM, giving him a strong background in electronic packaging design for both foam and corrugated. He then moved on to UFP Technologies where he engineered foam packaging products, including specialty thermoformed foam packages. At UFP, Thomson certified and ran an International Safe Transit Association (ISTA) lab. His experience in specialty packaging led to many years of package engineering for the US military, including injection and rotational molding of plastics and an understanding of how to engineer for advanced military test standards.
Today, Jim helps Walmart develop inbound packaging standards for suppliers worldwide. This includes setting test protocols required to get products safely through one of the world’s most advanced supply chains and gaining expertise in the growing field of automation technologies that will drive new standards for the retail industry for the next several decades. He also sits on the ISTA Global Board of Directors.
Other speakers at the event will include Jason Stein, CEO of Flat Six Media, and Christian Fischer, President and Chief Executive Officer of Georgia-Pacific. For more information, visit fibrebox.org.
