Milly Petriella Joins Milk and Honey as Local Managing Director

Milly Petriella is the new managing director of Milk and Honey across Australia and New Zealand.

In addition, she takes on the global responsibility of being director of cultural and social responsibility for the company, where she will be charged with championing awareness and equality for women, people of colour and the LGBTQIA+ community.

Most recently, Petriella was the director of member relations at APRA AMCOS. She announced her departure from the organisation last month after a 27-year stint.

Her new role with Milk and Honey kicks off on Oct. 1 and will be based in Sydney.

She will concentrate on signing new and established talent to the Australasia division of the company, with a focus on developing and mentoring female producers, as well as expanding and supporting awareness of diversity within the songwriter and producer community. She will also continue to represent the company’s top producers, writers and artists in the territory.

Lucas Keller, president and founder, said Petriella had been a friend of Milk and Honey for years, so it was a pleasure to officially welcome her to the family.

“As one of the most beloved executives in Australia and New Zealand by songwriters and artists, we could not think of a better way to upgrade our Sydney presence. We are bullish about ANZ and bringing prolific talent to the global stage and want to be the pre-eminent management company in the territory for songwriter and producer management,” he said.

“Diversity has been important to Milk and Honey since day one internally amongst our employees, but we’ve felt a calling to appoint someone to make sure we’re focusing on diversity on our roster and beyond our community,” he added.

“Today, we appoint Milly Petriella as our director of social and cultural responsibility in addition to her role at the company. Milly will ensure that Milk and Honey’s staff and clients are focused on opening paths for diverse talent to join our organisation and in a wider sense that we are pushing for inclusion of more women, people of colour, LGBTQ+ and folks from other cultures and countries around the world.”

Petriella said she is incredibly excited to join the Milk and Honey team and champion its diversity goals.

“The representation of women, people of colour and the LGBTQ+ community it important to Milk and Honey, not only within its rosters of clients but also within their team,” she said.

“Building and creating environments that are safe and inclusive within the business and creative community of the music industry need to be lead by organisations. It starts at the top and requires reform, codes of conduct and leadership to provide pathways for all to receive opportunities, mentoring, support and safe work environments. Milk and Honey is committed to this and I hope to help lead this important work and create models for other organisations to join us.”

Milk and Honey now boasts offices in Los Angeles, London, New York, Nashville, Dallas and Sydney. It has 30 employees, and has sold over $150 million in music publishing catalogue assets in the past couple of years.

Its roster includes songwriters and producers such as David Hodges, Oak Felder, Sir Nolan J. White Did It, Noah Goldstein and Jenna Andrews, as well as global DJs like Oliver Heldens and Benny Benassi.