Sue Busch

Colbert Packaging has found sustainable business in the pharmaceutical arena through a strong track record of earning certified supplier status with multiple Fortune 500 companies. This achievement has opened doors for the converter to work with similar customers that perform rigorous compliance checks on service providers, adds Jennifer Gross, manager, marketing and sales support.

Rex Lane recalls that when he first joined label and package converter WS Packaging Group as CEO in 2010, he was known in professional circles as "that guy they hired from outside the industry." And Lane is emphatic that the fresh eyes of a newcomer can be the key to effecting far-reaching improvements in operational efficiency.

Digital might be jockeying to become the industry's signature printing entrée, but it's clear that in many operations, there is still plenty of room on the table for flexo. At Atlanta-based narrow-web converter GENflex Labeling Solutions, for instance, a print process buffet of sorts is offered, in which both flexo and digital are billed as of vital importance to meeting customer needs.

In 2012, Universal Lubricants began exploring options to extend ECO ULTRA's environmental benefits to its exterior, and ideally, expand the motor oil's share of market. Ultimately, ECO ULTRA became the first re-refined motor oil to be offered at the retail level in a flexible package. It took about six months of reviewing mock-ups and prototypes; researching and testing pouch materials, spouts, and solutions; and gauging customer feedback via online consumer surveys, focus groups, and even conversations with NASCAR fans at the Daytona 500.

Action Packaging, a $15 million company headquartered in Ellington, CT, currently provides flexographic and digital printing services, as well as label application equipment (CTM Labeling and its own Gold Seal line), for food, beverage, household goods, and industrial products packaging.

For K-1 Packaging Group, a City of Industry-based, family-owned and operated producer of folding cartons, narrow-web labels, flexible packaging, and rigid boxes, the one-stop-shop definition is said to run deep. "While we are the proverbial jack-of-all-trades, we are not dabblers," says Mike Tsai, president. "Our in-house staffs that specialize in each of the print processes that we offer are deeply committed to their respective crafts."

As CANAMPAC sets its sights on attracting more national brands, it's clear that change is a fundamental certainty in its progression and its appeal to packaging end-users.

ImageTek can now enter the prime label market—including beverage, beer and wine, and food packaging applications—due to new digital technology investements, such as a Jetrion 4900 UV inkjet digital printing system.

In the past ten years alone, Palmas Printing in Melbourne, Fla., has navigated an impressive succession of major operational changes, all designed to more effectively serve present and future customers.

By investing in a variety of offset and flexo printing platforms to support its growth in folding carton converting, Bell Inc. has become one of the ten largest independent folding carton manufacturers in the United States.

In their 10-year partnership, Fort Worth, TX-based Motivating Graphics and ACTEGA Kelstar, have developed unique customer solutions, such as Starkote® ultra-high-rub aqueous coating and Ultrasheen® ultraviolet coating.

Clayton, N.C.-based 3C Packaging has logged a performance record worthy of the exclamation point that graces the company's logo. Specifically, the converting company, which also produces printed literature inserts and unit dose compliant packages, recently reported 20 percent growth during the 2010-2011 fiscal year.

“My 40˝ press just broke down, and my customer is insistent on the job. Is anyone nearby running a 40˝ press?” Fielding production back-up inquiries like this one is all in a day’s work for Andrew Willie, executive director of the Independent Carton Group (ICG). This 18-member association of independent folding carton converters strives to provide customers with competitive pricing, uninterrupted service, and cutting-edge technology and manufacturing capabilities.

Flexible packaging provider Exopack Holding Corp., the latest news is in the SKUs. This paper and plastic packaging converter, headquartered in Spartanburg, S.C., boasts 19 production facilities across North America and the United Kingdom, and supplies approximately 25,000 SKUs to 1,300 diverse customers.

For some end users, shrink sleeve label production has become the stuff of "nightmare stories," says Jim Dwyer, president and CEO of The R.B. Dwyer Group, an Anaheim, Calif.-based manufacturer and distributor of tamper-evident bands and shrink sleeves.