Innovative Pursuit of Packaging Excellence
Innovative™ Creative Packaging Solutions combines a drive for perfection with state-of-the-art packaging design, printing, and converting. The result is an advanced one-stop folding carton shop.
INNOVATIVE™ CREATIVE PACKAGING Solutions lives up to its name. For the past 20 years, the South Plainfield, N.J. company has been on the cutting-edge of high-quality folding carton design, printing, and converting.
Led by President/Chief Executive Officer Shawn Smith, Innovative has taken a progressive approach towards producing defect-free folding cartons. With a willingness to invest in new, state-of-the-art equipment and a business philosophy of "Do it right the first time!," Innovative has become a prominent player in producing folding cartons for the pharmaceutical, nutraceutical, and cosmetic markets.
Humble beginnings
Innovative started small in a 10,000 sq. ft. facility situated in a strip mall, producing folding cartons for the hotel amenities market. Two years later, the company switched its market focus to pharmaceuticals, nutraceuticals, and cosmetics, requiring a move to a 100,000 sq. ft. plant in 1989. Success has been a familiar condition ever since.
Innovative's sales have increased for the past several years, in spite of industry issues like the consolidation of both customer bases and competition, price pressures, and evolving technologies. Between 2001 and 2003, the company experienced a 10 percent sales growth—equal to $3.5 million—thanks to its creative approach to folding carton production and the stability of its main markets.
"These particular markets have enjoyed steady growth over the years. Innovative has grown with them and continues to be a valuable supplier to these markets," Smith said. "By continually investing capital in new equipment and technologies, the company is able to gain efficiencies and maintain a competitive advantage.
"Another factor that contributes to the success of the company is its staying true to its name by developing innovative, creative packaging solutions through ingenious structural design and award-winning graphic design services. Innovative's partnership philosophy is evident through strong relationships with its clients, as well as suppliers like Hewlett-Packard, Creo, Mitsubishi, Bobst, and Kodak. Developing partnerships with our vendors has also allowed us the opportunity to co-develop new technologies."
Innovative's success has turned heads, attracting ICV Capital Partners, a minority-owned equity firm from New York, which acquired the folding carton company in late May 2004.
"Innovative has been consistently profitable over the last four years," said Lloyd Metz, an ICV principal. "This is a direct result of its customer service-oriented culture that sets the company apart from its competitors. We are confident that Innovative is on track to win new pharmaceutical and cosmetics business."
New additions
Last year, while the package-printing industry as a whole was slowly recovering from three years of an unstable economy, Innovative bucked a trend and invested $3.3 million in new equipment and upgrades. The investment quickly proved its worth.
"We are fortunate to be in a position in 2004 to pioneer the latest technologies and trends in the industry—it's what allows Innovative to deliver high-impact, state-of-the-art packaging while remaining competitively priced," said Smith. "These substantial investments have reduced costs, improved efficiencies, and resulted in an overall increase in the quality of our client deliverables."
The new additions were as diverse as they were numerous. Included in the purchases was an HP Indigo ws4000 7-color digital label press—the first one in the state of New Jersey. In addition, Innovative added a 40˝ Mitsubishi 7-color in-line UV press and Sentinel ink management systems, which deliver ink to each of Innovative's offset printing units as needed, on demand.
The rest of the company's purchases went to enhancing its award-winning creative services/creative packaging solutions. Creo's direct-to-plate system was added to provide a highly efficient PDF workflow that greatly reduces steps in the production process, thereby increasing accuracy. A Data Tech DT-100 sample maker and plotter was added to enable 24-hour turnaround for structural samples by assisting in confirming all engineering specifications.
Innovative's purchases also included the Global Vision TVS-TM Color Proofreader to scan client-supplied artwork and the prepress proof. The proofer also optically compares the scan and proof against each other, alerting the operator if any discrepancies are found. And last but not least, it added BlenCal Scanners to enable scanning of the front and back of a sheet simultaneously, safeguarding product segregation throughout Innovative's diecutting department even when using inside printing.
Last year, in addition to the new equipment, the company also launched Innovative Promotional Solutions (IPS), a division created to service the promotional market.
"IPS offers all of the current technologies as Innovative with the addition of fulfillment and complete project management from start to finish, making it a full-service, one-stop-shop opportunity for our clients," Smith said. "This affords the client time savings by having all of the complicated, multi-process services required for promotional projects handled by a single company."
In total now, Innovative houses three Mitsubishi offset printing presses, an HP Indigo ws4000 press, and a Webtron 7-color flexographic press for print production. In-house services include digital label printing, UV flexo label printing, diecutting, gluing, sheeting, specialty coatings and finishes, ink mixing, and variable data printing, among others.
Eyes on a digital tomorrow
Innovative isn't done expanding its services and capabilities. The company is considering future additions, including shop-floor data collection for real-time production tracking, RFID (radio frequency identification) capabilities, digital carton printing, a Ko-Pack offset/flexo press, increased specialty inks and coatings, laser coding technology, additional digital label presses, and online ordering for digital labels.
Digital is a major area of concentration at Innovative. Of all the new equipment at Innovative, the HP Indigo ws4000 has caused the most excitement, Smith said. Digital printing offers customers the option of ordering one label or 30,000 labels, "without costly makeready and plate charges," he added.
"With the advent of digital printing for short-run work in the next three to five years, we as an industry leader see it as an opportunity to produce high-quality packaging just-in-time and in low quantities for a variety of different markets Innovative would normally not consider," Smith said. "Clients that currently cannot utilize folding cartons because of cost and time restrictions will have an opportunity to increase shelf presence and perceived value of their products with affordable, high-end, fully customizable packaging."
Whatever tomorrow brings, Innovative is prepared for the future of folding carton design, printing, and converting. "Innovative has continued to succeed and grow during difficult times," Smith said. "We are excited about what the future holds and we will continue to stick to our core business: private label pharmaceutical/
OTC, nutraceutical, and cosmetic. We have mastered the art of combination printing over the past 18 years and with our Innovative Color Simulator® 6-color process system we feel that our quality is second to none, allowing us to be very competitive, while at the same time giving the customer a high-end product."
by Kate Sharon
Associate Editor
