A former CEO of the British Coatings Federation, which serves the paint, wallpaper and printing ink industries in the UK, has been elected as Master of the Worshipful Company of Stationers and Newspaper Makers.
Tony Mash was born in Guildford, Surrey, but spent most of his formative years in North London. He was educated at the Stationers’ Company’s School in London, read chemistry at University College London and gained an MBA after studying at Manchester Business School and the Institute Supérieure des Affaires in Paris.
He was awarded the British Institute of Management Medal for his university thesis on pension fund performance appraisal, and then spent 27 years with ICI and AstraZeneca in a range of business development, procurement and change roles in the plastics, refrigeration gas, agrochemical and coatings sectors.
Tony later worked for British, American, Japanese and Australian companies and spent 16 years in the USA, where he took American citizenship.
He first visited Stationers’ Hall in 1962 as a member of the Stationers’ Company’s School choir. “I was 12 when we sang in the crypt of St Paul’s Cathedral,” he said. “We had rehearsed for this Ash Wednesday service for months and it was an astonishing moment my life. Afterwards we paraded back to Stationers’ Hall where the Master of the day gave us sausage and mash in the stock room – I’ll never forget it – and a shilling from the will of John Norton, who was a Master in the early 1600s.
“I then walked into the Hall and just fell in love with it. I can only describe how I felt with an American word – awesome! I thoroughly enjoyed going back to the Hall with the choir for the next six years. I was very impressed every time I met each year’s Master but I never dreamed that one day I’d become Master.”
On becoming president of the Old Stationers’ Association in 2002, Tony was invited to join the Stationers’ Company and became a liveryman in 2003. First appointed as trade association liaison, he later ran the company’s Innovation Excellence Awards for its first four years.
He joined the court of the company in 2014 and has since chaired the industry and the marketing advisory committees. He is the treasurer of the Friends of the Stationers’ Foundation in the USA.
Tony lives with his wife of 40 years, Melissa, near Godalming, Surrey and they have a second home in Pennsylvania, USA. They have three daughters who live in San Francisco, London and Madrid. In his spare time, Tony is a pianist, composer of music, amateur acting enthusiast and a ‘struggling golfer’. As a student, he performed at the Nottingham and Edinburgh Fringe Festivals and later acted in and composed music for amateur productions in Hertfordshire.
