Admiral Packaging Values Its Lean Approach And Customer Focus

By Noel Ward

The Importance of Lamination

About 150 customers rely on Admiral for packaging materials and for a full range of flexible packaging from basic polyethylene bags to standup pouches. Jobs range from less than 10,000 linear feet to more than one million. As flexible packaging has become more complex, laminating has become a key part of the manufacturing process.

“Being able to laminate two films together opened up the world,” notes Admiral Packaging President Harley Frank. “About 70 percent of our products are laminated. We use a lot of metallized films and barrier films. A lot of foods need a high-moisture barrier and a layer of metallized polypropylene in the middle because of a four to six month product shelf life. Without lamination you’d never be able to do that efficiently.”

"People buying packaging want to deal with someone who understands packaging," says Harley Frank. This seems only logical, but it is one of the driving philosophies at Admiral Packaging in Providence, Rhode Island. Frank, president of the family-owned flexible packaging company with a four-generation legacy, applies this thinking throughout the business, from sales, to the pressroom floor, to customer service.

"In many companies customer service is an entry-level job," he explains. "Not here. Our CSRs grow into their roles and have to know about all the other moving parts in our processes. Our customers definitely appreciate them having that knowledge. In addition, we really focus on on-time delivery. We don't have customers calling up saying, 'That was supposed to be here yesterday.' That doesn't happen."

This approach is part of Admiral's business mantra—give customers what they want, when they want it, at a fair price. "We have made a strategic point of becoming very efficient at processing orders and clearly communicating with our customers," says Frank.

Learning to be lean

Adopting lean manufacturing processes throughout the company was key to making this part of Admiral's culture. It was a sea of change that transformed the company and remains a driving force today.

"About 10 years ago I was involved in YPO (Young Presidents Organization) and heard some presentations on lean processes. I toured some factories that were using a lean approach to see it first-hand. And I was hooked," relates Frank.

Part of the lean manufacturing process is sharing it with others, which gave Frank the opportunity to be mentored by a man committed to lean practices.

"He headed a company in a different industry, but the core processes still applied," Frank says. "My team and I visited his factory and some of his people came here to help train all of us. It was a real special kind of exchange."

Initially skeptical, Admiral's employees soon realized "lean" wasn't a threat or top-down mandate. Moreover, it showed that management listened to what they had to say. For example, as they looked at how work was processed and moved through the plant, it was obvious that several departments were in the wrong locations, wasting time and adding inefficiency. Entire departments were relocated to move the various steps in the production process closer together to streamline operations.

"The people actually doing the work are the best ones to say how it can be done better," says Frank. "We give the equipment operators and other associates the tools, so changes come from bottom up, not top down. Do that, and you see huge improvements in the way things are done. Such as how big chunks of time—like being down or waiting for something—are being eliminated. Our associates take great pride in being able to accomplish something."

"We've been training our associates and implementing lean practices for 10 years," recounts John Wilbur, Admiral vice president. "It has spread throughout our culture. People want to do better. It can be little things like, 'If I had my tools here instead of there, I could be more efficient.' And those are changes we can make. Success with lean is in many ways a large number of small, incremental changes that in totality make a very big difference that ultimately impacts the bottom line."

The benefits are ones that have underscored Admiral's approach to business: on-time delivery, a dedication to quality, employee morale, and success as a flexible packaging company. These have combined with lean practices to foster extensive cross-training.

"This allows us to flex our crews to where customer demand is," explains Frank. "For example, if we need a lot of lamination done we can put more people on laminating. It allows us to be nimble, putting the best people in key slots when we need them. And no one complains about it. They recognize that a company can't be successful these days if each person does only one job."

"We have a very experienced, cross-trained group of associates running the best machines in the industry," affirms Wilbur.

Helping the Admiral team up the learning curve, the company has used workforce training grants from the state of Rhode Island to support operator training. "A very smart investment," notes Frank, an advocate of ongoing training and the lean mantra of continuous improvement that fosters customer support.

Solving customer problems

The depth of experience across the Admiral staff is one of the reasons its customers rely on the company. Admiral's design and graphics teams often work with customers' design concept or other challenges. "We'll do the layout, the separations, all the steps to make the package work," says Frank. "Then we'll take it one step further. We use GMG color management and an Epson proofer to make a proof that will match what comes off our Windmoeller & Hoelscher presses. We want to give them something they can approve and that we can match with a high degree of accuracy. Press approvals go very quickly, no surprises."

Frank believes using these digital controls for proofing is part of tightening up a critical process to provide excellent repeatability. "I think of how it used to be done," he says. "We'd be proofing a job on a little side press with all the labor involved to do that and get it correct. And you still didn't have the degree of success, reliability or repeatability that we get with digital tools."

Frank thinks the present generation of equipment is the best match yet of computer and mechanical technology. "There were a lot of problems with the previous generations. The mechanical side worked well, but the computer side did not. We're finally at a point where software and the hardware sides work together so we can turn jobs more efficiently, and do more for our customers."

Sometimes that support can involve a significant change in the package, such as a customer shifting from a bag in a box to a pouch. "This lets them move to a flexible pouch with high quality graphics. That adds shelf appeal, but it also allows them to pack and ship more efficiently, saving money on transportation and packaging materials," relates Frank.

He recounts a club store that had a large box containing a bag of pancake batter. "By switching to a standup pouch we solved a number of problems like reducing air in the package, increasing shelf life, and enhancing the visual display. Providing this kind of support extends our capabilities throughout the product and packaging value stream, creating a win-win for our customers and their customers."

Pouching progress

Almost every consumer product company seems to want a standup pouch these days, and producing pouches has been a learning experience for Admiral, which now runs two pouch-making machines. "It takes years to become a good pouch maker," affirms Frank. "Everything in the process impacts how that final pouch looks, from laminating the films to printing to applying the zippers. And making pouches can be the slowest process! You can print a big run of them in a few hours but it can take a few days to completely finish the pouches."

Admiral also works to fill customer needs across the spectrum of pouching needs. The company supplies substrates to customers who have their own printing and pouching equipment, while some buy printed and preformed pouches, and still others have Admiral print and manufacture pouches that are then filled elsewhere.

Frank sees three trends in pouches he thinks are likely to continue. One is that of fewer pouches being imported, which he believes has to do with food safety, quality and certifications. Second is the mix of equipment being installed at brand owners' and converters' operations that can both make the pouch and fill it. He also expects the preformed side to grow, both as preformed and printed pouches with zippers that are ready to fill, and as the roll stock Admiral sells to customers who make and fill the pouches on their own machinery.

Looking ahead

Frank does not have a specific revenue target in mind but operates under a strategy of steady growth with existing customers and by adding new customers. He sees the need coming to expand the existing facility and probably add a new press to handle the demand. Yet no matter how it changes, growth won't come at the expense of customers.

"We're not doing pit stop changes here," says Frank. "There are a lot of opportunities to make mistakes, so we want to always have the processes in place to make sure we're giving the customer what they want." pP

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