Packaging's agenda has been set in the last year by M&A, the green lobby and more than a dash of controversy. We take a light-hearted look back at the year and hand out the medals, trophies and prizes for the stories that shaped it.

COMEBACK OF THE YEAR
Winner: Europackaging
Packaging News readers were surprised this September by the return of the Majid family to the helm of struggling carrier bag supplier Europackaging. The move came three years after the family sold the company to private equity house MidOcean Partners.

Birmingham-based Europackaging has sales of more than £200m and supplies packaging products into major retail, wholesale, foodservice and janitorial sectors. Moorgate Capital, Lloyds Bank, Bank of Scotland and KPMG were all instrumental in securing the deal, which has safeguarded 800 jobs worldwide.

The Majid family were believed to have made £100m when they sold the business to MidOcean Partners in December 2006. Since then, the company has struggled to replicate the Majid's success. In a statement, the family said it was looking forward to "restoring the fortunes of the business".

Now the industry waits with bated breath to see what the Majids will do with the company next. Will they be able to fulfil their promise of placing the firm back on its feet? Only 2010 will tell.

TABLOID PACKAGING STORY OF THE YEAR
Winner: Maoam
Sex sells, but there are limits. In a letter to the Daily Mail in August, one reader spoke of his outrage at the illustrations on Maoam sweet packaging which, he said, showed a cartoon lemon and lime locked in a "carnal encounter".

Mr Simon Simpkins, from Pontefract, West Yorkshire bought the Haribo sweets for his young children and said he was disgusted by the image.

"My wife and I have always tried to maintain their innocence and to think our years of careful parenting could have been wrecked by, of all things, a sweet wrapper makes me livid," Simpkins told the Daily Mail.

A Maoam spokesperson said the wrappers were not created to cause offence but that the character was designed as a unique and jovial figure.

Packaging News readers were also curious about these sweet packs. In a matter of days the story rocketed into the top 10 most-read online stories of the year.

Runner-up: Recycling
As if a weak economy wasn't enough to deal with, recycling and waste management firms were forced on the defensive after a number of national media outlets published images of stockpiled waste alongside reports that the market had collapsed. However, householders continued to do their bit and, indeed, as the year progressed, the market picked up.