Better Together: 2024 SuperCorrExpo Live! - Episode 2

Welcome to the second of two special SuperCorrExpo 2024 episodes, recorded on site and unscripted at this amazing event. We do these event episodes to capture some of the energy you might experience if YOU were there: meeting peers, learning new things, and expanding the limits of your professional life.
Today's guests are:

Bowman Mitchell, VP national accounts at Redlist Software:
"In this world, operations is king. You've got to get as many boxes out that door as possible."

Jason Hooston, CEO & co-founder at Two10 Technologies:
"If I'm going to make a decision, the most important thing is that I want to have confidence in that decision... data is a big part of that."

Christine Little, director of sales, corrugated machinery, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries:
"We're focusing on what we're calling Declaration of the Independents. We're looking at the independent market a little differently."

Jeff Buchanan, director of sales and market development; and Tyler Haggard, director of business development, for HarperLove:
"If we can help improve productivity and reduce waste, it's huge in the marketplace not only for us, but also for our customers' savings."

Teemu Salo, managing director at Adara Pakkaus Oy:
"You need to rely on your partner. You need to keep good contacts and whatever comes up, you have to take it to the table and run through it."

Rick Putch, director of technical services and process improvement, National Steel Rule:
"If there's one thing in the corrugated industry that everybody's looking for, it's productivity gains. In class, I break it into three things."

These conversations were captured at SuperCorrExpo 2024, held September 8 - 12 in Orlando, FL. Occurring only once every four years, SCE is the premier trade show and conference dedicated to the corrugated packaging industry. It is organized by TAPPI and AICC.

SAVE THE DATE for SuperCorrExpo 2028, which will again take place September 8 - 12 in Orlando, FL.

Please remember to share, like, and subscribe!
And join us again for Better Together.

Transcript

SPEAKER_07 0:00

Thanks for tuning in to this special Supercore 2024 episode of Better Together, the Paper 360 Podcast. I'm Jan Bottelary, editor of Paper360 magazine, and your host for this special episode of Better Together, the Paper 360 Podcast. We took our podcast on the road to Orlando, Florida in September for Supercore Expo 2024 just to bring you these exclusive interviews. This is the second of our Supercore Expo 2024 episodes, and once again, our guests will cover a range of corrugated topics. Today, we will do what you would do if you were at the event, meet new friends, have a chat, and learn a little more about our dynamic industry. Our guests are Bowman Mitchell, Redlist Software, Jason Houston, 210 Technologies, Christine Little of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Jeff Buchanan and Tyler Haggard of Harper Love, Team Musalo from Adaropacus Oi, and Rick Pooch, National Steel Rule. Are you ready for a deep dive into all things corrugated? Well, let's get started. I'm here now with Bowman Mitchell. He's with Red List, he's VP of National Accounts, and I think this is your first Supercore Expo, right, Bowman?

SPEAKER_04 1:36

Yes, thank you for having me. Well exciting.

SPEAKER_07 1:40

Especially when I found out it was your first time here at Supercore Expo. Tell me how the show's been for you.

SPEAKER_04 1:46

It's been great. Um, lots of action at our booth. Uh, a lot of our current customers, a lot of potential customers. Um just naturally happened to come to Supercore because it's I mean, we're in this space a lot over the last four years. We've gotten a lot of corrugated customers, and uh, we just decided we'd come because that's where all our customers are gonna be, and hopefully we can expand the the base.

SPEAKER_07 2:09

I love it. There's really nothing that can take the place of that face-to-face meeting, those handshakes.

SPEAKER_04 2:14

Oh yeah. Super fan of in-person.

SPEAKER_07 2:16

Yeah, I like that. But Redless has been serving the corrugated industry for a while now, right?

SPEAKER_04 2:22

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_07 2:22

And what do you do?

SPEAKER_04 2:24

So it's uh it's a software. So uh software as a service. What we do is basically uh I like the best comparison that I can give for people is it's a GPS for maintenance.

SPEAKER_07 2:36

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_04 2:37

Um in the same way, like me and you, we use the GPS all the time, right?

SPEAKER_07 2:41

All the time.

SPEAKER_04 2:42

When's the last time you uh took a GPS training?

SPEAKER_07 2:46

Never.

unknown 2:47

Right?

SPEAKER_04 2:48

I mean, that's the beautiful part about a GPS. Anybody, regardless of your age, yeah, whether you're young, old, maybe not too old, but you know, you just pull out your phone and you type in the address, it tells you where to go. Yeah. When to turn right, when to turn left, when to go straight. Um, that's what we do for lubrication, specifically for operators to do operator basic care. Um, one of the big struggles that we've seen in just attending some of the conferences and the in the speaking sessions is the the struggle that all these plants have is, you know, COVID did a big number on everybody. Um a lot of the talent left. Rehiring good talent is hard. People that know the equipment is few and far between. And so you're stuck with either training people every time you get a new person, which is kind of a revolving door, yeah, or you provide them with a GPS experience.

SPEAKER_07 3:38

Oh, yeah. Okay, I see I get it.

SPEAKER_04 3:40

Does that make sense? So it does. When you walk up to the asset, you know, whether it's a single face or double backer, a flexo machine, these these machines are incredibly complex. Um, one machine could have, you know, a thousand loop points on it. Oh wow. One section of a machine could have a hundred loop points on it. And you know, most companies don't feel comfortable trusting a new guy. A kid kid just got out of high school to grease or lubricate a machine correctly. So they feel like they have to train. Constantly training, constantly training. But the problem with that is it's a revolving door, so you're you're you're constantly training. But the other big problem that they have is seeing what's done and not done. In this world, you know, operations is king. You know, you gotta get as many boxes out that door as possible.

SPEAKER_07 4:34

Yep.

SPEAKER_04 4:35

And the problem with maintenance and operations is this constant battle of, hey, I need access to the machine to lubricate it so it doesn't break down. But operations is saying, okay, hurry, get your locks off, we gotta get this machine running again.

SPEAKER_07 4:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 4:48

And uh most systems that people deal with have um a work order that says, hey, go lubricate this machine. And the the details are like maybe a couple pages, maybe a couple line items. But they don't correctly like accommodate the complexity of the machine. You can't go tell a new guy, go grease the bearings.

SPEAKER_08 5:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 5:10

When you've got two of these bearings that are super hot that take this grease, and they take two pumps every three weeks, and then you know these 20 bearings take a different grease, and this this hydraulic system takes a specific oil, that gear takes a different oil, and it's just incredibly complex. So we break it down for them, so they scan it, and they basically can just say, What do I gotta do today? I gotta check this level, top it off, I gotta change this breather, grease that bearing with two shots of the blue grease, and grease that bearing with three shots of the red grease.

SPEAKER_07 5:42

Wow, so it really is like a G. Turn right, turn left, go straight. Turn left, go straight. That's amazing. That's actually a great metaphor because I mean you've got to make it simple. You get there, it figures out the quickest route for you, uh, the most efficient route for you, and it gets you there.

SPEAKER_04 6:00

And and what it what it really does for the managers is instead of just, you know, the current process for a lot of people is PM the machine, you get halfway done, you do as much as you can, um, and then ops takes the machine back, you gotta pull your locks, and then the one option that they're left with is I gotta turn my paperwork in for today. Right? I gotta say, hey, I did it, but I only did half of them.

SPEAKER_07 6:25

Well, where'd you stop?

SPEAKER_04 6:26

And if I switch half. If I skip five or six points, any one of those points could shut the machine down for a day and a half.

SPEAKER_07 6:32

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_04 6:33

That could cost a company fifty thousand dollars.

SPEAKER_07 6:35

Well, you know, lubrication is such a basic thing.

SPEAKER_04 6:38

It's basic.

SPEAKER_07 6:38

It's a basic thing, but it's critical to that uptime.

SPEAKER_04 6:43

Right. I mean, for me and you, we have a couple cars maybe.

SPEAKER_07 6:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 6:47

It's easy to remember to change the oil every 10,000 miles. But a plant manager has, you know, maybe five, six lines with a corrugator. That's 2,500 points. Wow. To track seven-day, thirty-day, sixty-day, ninety-day intervals. Right. It's it's really complex. So we just try to break it down so it's simple. They scan it, they see what's coming, what's updue, check it off, and then at any given time they can see in their plant any any piece of equipment that's overdue, they'll know about it.

SPEAKER_08 7:17

Okay.

SPEAKER_04 7:17

And so we go through, tag everything, document every point, take pictures of everything, and then organize it into simple routes. So you literally pull out your phone, scan the equipment, and it just tells you what to do.

SPEAKER_07 7:29

Wow. Now you said that the system itself can keep track of whether the work's been done.

SPEAKER_04 7:35

Right. We call it proof of presence.

SPEAKER_07 7:37

Oh.

SPEAKER_04 7:37

And so um we had a customer that actually re required us to do this because they were having problems with, you know, the the the industry calls it pep pencil whipping. Basically, it's this concept where someone just checks everything off, even though they may have done everything or maybe skipped a couple things, but they just check it off, right? And even the problem of just sitting in the break room checking things off and not physically going to the assets.

SPEAKER_08 8:04

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_04 8:05

So one of our customers, yeah, they required what we call proof of presence. So it basically physically requires them to be present. You scan into the card, it's chipped, so you can say, you know, I I'm there, then it requires then it allows you to start completing work.

SPEAKER_07 8:19

Wow.

SPEAKER_04 8:20

And we were a little bit hesitant to roll that out because it kind of feels, you know, heavy-handed a little bit. Like big brother, you know, I'm making sure you're not lying. But uh, we were actually, you know, we we uh rolled it out about a year later. One of the customers, we started interviewing them and said, Hey, how's this proof presence going? You know, and and we were talking to the actual tech.

SPEAKER_07 8:40

Okay.

SPEAKER_04 8:41

Not the bosses or the guy on the floor. And he said, I love it. And we're like, wait a minute, but why is this, you know, tell me more? And they were like, Well, before Red List, um, I'd come into work wondering what I was gonna be blamed for, who was gonna throw me under the bus, what what problem did I not do or didn't do that caused the failure, it was always my fault. And the reality is it wasn't his fault, it was the process's fault. Because if if he's halfway through his work and then does isn't allowed to finish, yeah, you know, he has no way to show what he didn't do because the system doesn't allow for it. It has one checkbox, did you do this work order or not?

SPEAKER_08 9:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 9:25

So after, you know, you you document all the points and then allow him to check it off point by point, he basically said, now my life has changed because one, we went from two bearing failures a week in this plant to one a quarter. Oh wow.

SPEAKER_08 9:42

What an improvement.

SPEAKER_04 9:43

Yeah, I mean, for them it was half a million dollars a quarter in in production. But I mean, that's a little bit of an extreme example. Not everybody has that.

SPEAKER_07 9:51

Sure, but it it's real.

SPEAKER_04 9:52

For him, the big, the big, you know, yeah, benefit was he didn't come into work thinking who's gonna blame me because he knew, and everybody knew. He's the hero. He reduced failures, and then the next thing that you know he said is like, I don't come into work worrying about being blamed for stuff because that I know they can look in the system, scan the asset, and say, hey, I was there. Bowman was Johnny on the spot. Yeah, he he put five pumps of red grease in this bearing on April 1st, you know.

SPEAKER_07 10:22

Yep, just how he was supposed to.

SPEAKER_04 10:24

We're we're excited because um we've we have success selling it to the corrugated. Um, one of the things that we see about this market is it's a little bit underserved.

SPEAKER_08 10:36

You know, okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 10:37

The people in our world don't treat it like, oh, this is a big paper mill with thousands of employees or whatever, but they have all the same problems.

SPEAKER_08 10:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 10:45

And for a very, you know, small fee a year, we can solve million dollar problems pr relatively quick quickly. I mean, it doesn't take years to set up. We're talking weeks. Wow. And uh I mean, like you said, it lubrications some people skip over it, but it's really the the fundamental literally keeps the gears turning. Would you ever consider skipping your oil change?

SPEAKER_07 11:12

No, I would not. Well, because I want to get a few more miles out of that car.

SPEAKER_04 11:16

What I can tell you is plants skip lubrication points every single day.

SPEAKER_07 11:20

And yet those machines cost more than my Subaru.

SPEAKER_04 11:23

Oh, they're millions of dollars. And and it's and you're and they they they wonder why they're breaking.

SPEAKER_07 11:31

Okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 11:32

Right? It's it's simple stuff.

SPEAKER_07 11:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 11:34

But it's complex at the same time. So that's what we try to help people do, is make simplify the hard stuff and make it easy.

SPEAKER_07 11:40

That's really great.

SPEAKER_04 11:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 11:42

Yeah. Well, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. I've really learned a lot, and um, I loved your metaphor about the GPS.

SPEAKER_08 11:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 11:52

Um, and I'll just say help us find the future, right? Because that's it's kind of what it's kind of a theme here.

SPEAKER_04 11:59

I've learned a lot at this conference, met a lot of cool people, and uh obviously you. Thank you for inviting me to the podcast.

SPEAKER_07 12:06

Thanks for being on the podcast, Bowman. I've really had a it's been a pleasure talking to you.

SPEAKER_04 12:10

Yeah, thank you. We'll see you again.

SPEAKER_07 12:16

Well, I'm excited to welcome Jason Houston. He's Chief Executive Officer for 210 Technologies, and we've just been chatting a little about um AI. And Jason was also a participant on our AI panel right here at Supercore Expo. Thanks for coming on the podcast, Jason.

SPEAKER_02 12:35

Yeah, this is great. Thanks, Jen, for having me.

SPEAKER_07 12:37

Yeah, absolutely. So tell us a little about the panel and about what AI means to the corrugated industry.

SPEAKER_02 12:46

Well, it was interesting. I f I thought the whoever had the forward thought of not just representing AI from the tech providers, which we can talk tech and talk about futuristic opportunities, uh, it was very well put together in that we had representation from the box plants and the tech providers. Uh so it created a really uh strong dialogue with the audience being, of course, suppliers and customers as well. Um it gave the perspective of not only what is AI and technology capable of, but the perspective of here's what we'd like it to do, or here's what we think it can do right now. So we were able to have a very strong dialogue. Yeah, we thought going into it we'd just have pretty dry question and answer back and forth, but it really turned into a meaningful dialogue with the the panel. It was great.

SPEAKER_07 13:37

Yeah, in spite of uh all the rumors and suspicions, Corrugated people are not dry and dull. They are they're dedicated to what they do and they really want those answers.

SPEAKER_02 13:48

A lot of passion.

SPEAKER_07 13:49

Yeah, a lot of passion, a lot of passion. So tell us where 210 fits in with this.

SPEAKER_02 13:55

So we are the business intelligence and AI provider provider for Corrugated. Uh it's a new space. So when people say, well, who else is doing this and um you know what other companies, um, it's new, you know. So there's not a laundry list of people that are knocking on the door saying, Hey, I'd like to put AI in your box plan. Um and we understand that. Um being in a new space, it you have to communicate what AI is, what business intelligence is, and that is a different, there is a delineation between those two, which is important to communicate. And what is the foundation for being able to take advantage of these things? You know, you can put these tools into your business and not have them net you much out of it if you're not prepared and don't have the path mapped out correctly.

SPEAKER_07 14:40

Right. And I think that's a real risk because in a business like Corrugated, every percentage point makes a difference, right?

SPEAKER_02 14:49

It does, yeah. We're yeah, we are a very thin margin industry.

SPEAKER_07 14:54

Right, right. So can you tell us a little about some of the capabilities that you can give a corrugated plant?

SPEAKER_02 15:00

I'd love to. So uh the foundation, of course, with any technology tool, especially in what we do, is data. Uh we generate a lot of it. You know, in our industry, we have shop floor data, accounting data, operational data. Uh it's it's everywhere. And in part of uh what I spoke about in the panel is uh the corrugated industry, um, really as part of a larger industry sector called manufacturing, generates more data than any other industry sector in the entire economy. Wow, and if you think about the other industry sectors are finance, healthcare, government. Think about how much data the government, yeah, we we see that all the time all over the news. We generate by a factor of two more data than any other industry sector. However, a recent uh Deloitte study showed not only do we generate that much data, but the utilization and benefit that we get out of that data, we fall in in remarkable last place in all of those industry sectors. So the capitalization and the usefulness of that data and and painting a data story is underutilized. Right. And that's part of the gap that we fill.

SPEAKER_07 16:08

So we have more data and are doing less with it.

SPEAKER_02 16:11

That's right.

SPEAKER_07 16:12

That's okay. I see that as not a fault, but I see it as a tremendous opportunity.

SPEAKER_02 16:17

It is, it's a spotlight that you know it gets me awake every morning and gets me thinking about how can I change that?

SPEAKER_07 16:23

Oh, nice. That's a great attitude. So, what are some of the things your customers are most asking about AI and what it can do for them?

SPEAKER_02 16:33

I think it's a very basic question that we get asked the most, which is what is AI? You know, just the definition of it. You know, you can easily have that vision of the robots coming out of killer robots hoping to rule us all.

SPEAKER_07 16:47

That's AI, right?

SPEAKER_02 16:48

Yeah. So here's the reality. We've had AI in our lives for the better part of a decade. You know, just from the simple analogy of Google Maps. Everybody uses it. They probably used it to get here at Supercore Expo.

SPEAKER_08 16:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:00

Um, you know, Google Maps has its original inception. If you want to think about the evolution of it, is everybody had an atlas in the 90s, right? You opened it up, it said, here's here's all the different states, here's all the different cities, and you had to know where you were on that map.

SPEAKER_07 17:13

One of those maps that's impossible to fold together.

SPEAKER_02 17:18

Definitely. I remember that on summer vacation trying to get that back in the carry-home bag for sure. Then the evolution of that was, oh, here's Google Maps. It has a pin that shows me where I am. I don't need the Atlas, it says here's where you are. Continuing down in the technology journey, the next layer we had, which was huge, was um Google adopted Waze, and that showed you traffic patterns. And now it wasn't just here's where you are, but here's how you get to where you want to go, and here are the obstacles you might encounter with traffic. And then the final kind of uh tie of all of that is, and everybody gets this on their phone now, is it uh AI can look at your calendar and say, you have an appointment, it's across town, there's traffic, it's time for you to leave now, right? That's AI. It's multiple data sources coming together. The computer learned your habits and it knew it was time for you to leave. That's part of AI. So my point in that, Jen, is just simply we've had it in our lives. It's not this futuristic pie in the sky that we're never going to achieve with you know the running of the world by machines. This is uh AI relies on data and data relies on people. Good, solace, solid business processes lead to good, strong, trusted data that you can then benefit using AI.

SPEAKER_07 18:30

Right. And the big benefit is being able to make decisions about where you want to go.

SPEAKER_02 18:35

It is, and any good leader in this building, um, and I've talked to many of them this week, they make good decisions based on experience, they base it on their gut, and a lot of times they based it on past history, but without having the data in front of them. We call those gut decisions. And there are leaders that are very, very good at those gut decisions. However, many of those, excuse me, many of those leaders are handing off to newer generation. They're handing off yeah, kind of the changing of the guard. And we are used to being a data-based society, right? There's data all around us. So if I'm going to make a decision, the most important thing to me is I want to have confidence in that decision.

SPEAKER_08 19:17

Right.

SPEAKER_02 19:17

Any decision I make, not just for business. To have confidence in it, a lot of times data is a big part of that. So we we are trying to fill that gap and give leaders confidence in their decisions.

SPEAKER_07 19:28

Yeah, that's excellent. That's excellent. So many corrugated manufacturers right now are operating using data systems, plural, where it might be hard to really pull them together, though.

SPEAKER_02 19:46

It is. You know, you have five, six, seven different pieces of software, all written in different uh computer languages, all with different interfaces, and from the input standpoint, meaning putting data into those pieces of software, they're all very good at what they do in their individual business areas. But the output side is tends to be list of transactions. It tends to be very uh almost spreadsheet like instead of being instead of being graphic and able to see trends and spot them very, very quickly. So that's another portion of the business intelligence and the AI side of things is the ability to spotlight things very quickly.

SPEAKER_07 20:26

And that's something your technologies can do?

SPEAKER_02 20:29

It does, yes. Our dashboarding is uh very visual, it's based on you know bar graphs, line graphs, but not only that, the ability to take that trend, and if you wanted to answer the question of why did we have a good month, or why did this machine not run like we expected it to, that gets into less of descriptive analytics, which is more like your list of transactions on a spreadsheet, and now you're stepping into what's called diagnostic analytics, where you can answer the question of why did this happen?

SPEAKER_07 20:57

Right.

SPEAKER_02 20:57

So where that comes in with our solutions is you see the graphical trend, and that's the the description, the descriptive analytic, and then you can double tap on that analytic and see the answer to what caused that, what led to it, what was the data points that said here's where the opportunity for success was.

SPEAKER_07 21:15

Because you can't improve unless you have the data about where that, you know, where the problems lie.

SPEAKER_02 21:24

Yeah, going back to old school business school, talking about root cause analysis. Yep. Yeah, let's get to the root of it.

SPEAKER_07 21:29

Yeah. That's terrific. Um is there any can you think of a customer that has really been surprised by what you offer or surprised by what they can do with it?

SPEAKER_02 21:40

Sure, yeah. When we go into customers again, we're in a very new um industry sector and trying to bring technology to Corrugated, right? When you say technology and corrugated together, people think digital print and they think of the manufacturing processes, but not necessarily the operational and the software side of things. Um but the the Surprising part of it is how quickly and how easily it is adopted.

SPEAKER_07 22:05

That would surprise me because it sounds a little scary still, even with your clear descriptions.

SPEAKER_02 22:11

It is. It's not easy, and I don't want to oversell the simplicity of putting something like this into place because it does require an aspect of leadership. It's not just the technical of connecting the systems and painting the dashboards and providing this the application on the mobile devices. This is a leadership culture change to make database decisions. You know, if you're going to uh here's a good example. A lot of our uh corrugated leaders, they work with their suppliers very closely. They want to watch the metrics of lead times, are you meeting my due dates? They want to make sure that all of my uh allocations for paper are being met. I'm getting the uh materials that you promised you would be able to provide me. And when we have um in older technologies, when we have the opportunity to uh manage our suppliers, we a lot of times glaze over that and say, you know what, we won't push as hard because we don't have hard data to show them. We just have gut to say we're not getting what we asked for.

SPEAKER_07 23:12

But that's a big responsibility, too.

SPEAKER_02 23:14

It is. And you know, when you have hard numbers, it makes those conversations a lot easier when you say, gosh, guys, you're doing a great job. Let me show you what your on-time delivery is, let me show you what you're you're meeting and what you're doing for a business. Yeah. Or the other, here's an opportunity. And I don't have to have that hard conversation. It's literally just showing numbers.

SPEAKER_07 23:32

Yeah, it goes both ways.

SPEAKER_02 23:33

It does. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 23:34

Terrific. Well, Jason, thank you so much. I'm excited about the future.

SPEAKER_02 23:38

Yeah, me too.

SPEAKER_08 23:39

Thank you, Jen.

SPEAKER_07 23:44

I'm pleased again to speak with Christine Little. She's with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Director of Sales in the Corrugated Machinery Division. And Christine, it's great to have you back on Better Together. Thanks, Jan. Love to be back. How's the show been going for you so far?

SPEAKER_09 24:01

Pretty good, pretty good. Uh a lot of international customers, uh, customers maybe that we didn't see three years ago. Cool. Uh ones that you know aren't gonna come to uh Cleveland or or San Antonio, everyone views this more as the international show. So traffic has been good.

SPEAKER_07 24:18

Good. That's always great to hear. That's always great to hear. Um, you have a great booth on the floor. Um and um what have you been up to as an attendee here at Supercore Expo?

SPEAKER_09 24:31

Ooh, I've been busy. I think this is probably the busiest I've ever been. Um on top of, you know, obviously uh meeting with customers, customers coming by the booth, entertaining, all that kind of stuff. Um, some things that I've been involved in uh was I was on a panel that was mostly women. Um it was called uh From AI to Z, Marketing Your Business. Um and then the other thing is AICC has a new women in corrugated group that we started earlier this year. And we had a breakfast this morning, we have a meeting tomorrow. Looking to get anybody involved in AICC or TAPI, um, you know, kind of combine them together for focusing on women in corrugated.

SPEAKER_07 25:16

Oh, that's terrific. I, you know, I I do see a real opportunity for women in Corrugated. I think it's a much more creative field than a lot of people outside of the industry realize. And with all the staffing problems we're having, there are so many young women looking for an industry where they can really make a mark, I think.

SPEAKER_09 25:39

I think so too. I think you can do, you know, just with any manufacturing business, there's sales opportunities, management, uh, accounting, right? Design, um, you know, production floor, be, you know, a production manager. Everything has changed since I started in the business 30 years ago, and it's great to see, but I think we need to run with it and encourage it, and what can we do to mentor it?

SPEAKER_07 26:06

Oh, I absolutely agree. It's not, and this is just my opinion, but as a woman who has been writing about this industry for more than 30 years, um, I think it's not just enough to say, you know, we welcome any woman who walks through the door. I think uh the culture needs to open up and go out and look for those promising young women who may not know the uh vast opportunities available.

SPEAKER_09 26:34

Oh, I agree. It takes more, you know, we we had one speaker this morning that she said she had no idea that there was an an industry that focused on boxes. Right. And now she's at Clemson and in a whole program and she's doing, you know, I mean she's super excited about it. Where we need to get, we even said more than the high school or the colleges, let's start with the middle schools.

SPEAKER_07 27:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_09 27:01

And manufacturing in general, but of course we all have a love for corrugated.

SPEAKER_07 27:04

So Yeah. But I think at that middle school level is before young women and girls learn that maybe technical fields, I'm making air quotes here for listeners, aren't for them. Because they absolutely are for them. So we need to get them before you know that that sort of bias is built in.

SPEAKER_09 27:30

Uh someone's interested in chemistry. This was said this morning. You can do that in Corrugated. Someone's interested in physics, you can do that in the corrugated industry. It there's so many options and alternatives, but how do we convey that to the masses? And it's gonna take AICC and Tappy doing women in Corrugated and doing a mentorship program, speaking at the general sessions. That's that's the only way we're gonna get it out.

SPEAKER_07 27:59

I love it. I love it. And we'll keep working on that.

SPEAKER_09 28:02

We will.

SPEAKER_07 28:03

Um I love it. But now you were telling me a little before we started, too, that MHI, which always is a very innovative um company, always looking for new things. You're kind of focusing your innovation in a different way this year.

SPEAKER_09 28:17

We are.

SPEAKER_07 28:18

Oh, tell me about it.

SPEAKER_09 28:19

We're trying to uh explore or or tell everyone what makes us different. Why are we a different m uh machinery company than anybody else out there? Um, you know, we I've talked in the past with you that we had a pre-feeder and a a new flexo. Um and we still do. Uh we had successful installations within the last year, but we're focusing on what we're calling declaration of the independence. Oh, I like it. We're looking at uh the independent market a little differently, and we're trying to educate them on how MHI is different from service and parts and um catering to what you need, not just throwing a service program that we developed that we think you need.

SPEAKER_08 29:01

Sure.

SPEAKER_09 29:01

Um we have a new PIP program where it started off to be we're going to do this, and it's now evolved into, well, we can, you know, look at either maintenance or we can look at more education or training or whatever. We'll cater it to whatever you need and and as often as you need. So I think that's what's going to make a difference in the independent um box companies as opposed to, you know, your larger uh box companies.

SPEAKER_07 29:30

Sure. I think uh Corrugated is one of the few, I think, major manufacturing companies where there still is a really large number of these smaller, independent companies that are very successful being independent, uh but who might be missing out on some of the bigger picture stuff from suppliers like MHI.

SPEAKER_09 29:51

And that's the market that, you know, uh MHI has been known to produce equipment that I think had this, you know, notion that it was for the the larger companies, the big guys, uh, just to keep eating trees or whatever you want to say, more square footage. And that and I'm not taken away from that, but the independence, it's a good fit for some of them as well. But how are we gonna treat them differently? Um, and that's usually in service and being responsive, um, just being there, holding their hand the entire journey. I think that's one of our panels is we're with you through the entire journey.

SPEAKER_07 30:29

That's great. So you've got the you say you've got some newer installations of of some of your um major equipment. Uh what have you learned from customers? What do they need?

SPEAKER_09 30:41

Well, everybody's different, right? Um, you know, there are some products that people that we used to be in the market uh or have in the market that people wish we would bring back. Um we'll have others that are asking us to explore uh different, you know, machinery. Also AI. Uh you know, we're really exploring AI uh from our service standpoint, our call center, you know, all that kind of stuff. We're we're exploring what we can do. I think it'll help us be better in the long run if we implement AI in some form.

SPEAKER_07 31:19

Sure. Do you think there is a like a particular role for AI with an independent corrugator? Or is it just help in general?

SPEAKER_09 31:29

Um I think if you use it for the right reasons, you know, um independents are going to have the labor issues just like anybody else. So if you can use AI for automation to make it a little bit easier for everyone, um then I do think it has a place in in if you want to say the independence, the small you know, family-owned company. They're not gonna have or or have the need that maybe a large integrated um would need it for, but there's still some form that they're gonna need, I would think.

SPEAKER_07 32:04

Sure. And I I've seen that too, what you were saying, that every corrugator is different.

SPEAKER_09 32:09

Their customer base is different, their specialties are different, culture, yeah, everything is a little bit different. Um, but what do they have that is a common thread? Is usually generational businesses um have you know second, third, whatever, you know, generation is still running the company. Um they will do the hard-to-do stuff, they will give that, go that extra mile, they appreciate their customers um in a different way. So yeah, the independence are different.

SPEAKER_07 32:42

So in a way you're trying to mirror that culture back at them, right?

SPEAKER_09 32:47

With absolutely you you picked up on that. So, in order for them to understand, we had to almost replicate them, right?

SPEAKER_07 32:57

Yeah. I like that. I like that though. Um so you've been working with customers, we've had these machine installations. What do you see ahead? Either for MHI or for your customers who may corrugate it. What do you see ahead for the industry?

SPEAKER_09 33:14

Um, you know, I think just being innovative for sure. Um helping them out with the problems that they have, whether that's um making it easier to run, less um maintenance or or TCO or helping that bottom line. I but I think first and foremost, everybody um we need to listen to the customer. Everybody is different. I would love to have a cookie cutter machine that I, you know, have ready to go and everybody buys the exact same, but it not everybody wants the same. So listening to what everybody needs, I think is gonna be very important for longevity for all of us.

SPEAKER_07 33:55

Yeah, I agree.

SPEAKER_09 33:56

I agree, and just keeping those communication lines open. Be transparent and and also remember that it's a partnership. Yeah. At the end of the day, just like I want to have a partnership with my suppliers, I want my, you know, the customers to feel the same way. Sure.

SPEAKER_07 34:12

Uh I completely agree. Your customers are lucky. Um, I hope you have a great year of learning more about them and they about you. Terrific.

SPEAKER_09 34:22

We will we will definitely uh tell you next year. We'll give you a little update on how it went. Exactly. Come back and tell me what you learned. You got it. Thanks, Jan. Thanks, Christine.

SPEAKER_07 34:37

And now on Better Together, we have Tyler Haggard, he's director of business development, and we have Jeff Buchanan, who is director of sales and market development, both for Harper Love. Thanks for coming on the show, guys. Thanks, Jan.

SPEAKER_06 34:50

Glad to be here.

SPEAKER_07 34:51

Yeah, so how's the show going for you so far?

SPEAKER_06 34:53

It's going good so far. Uh, first day, traffic's been pretty good coming by the booth. So uh we're looking forward to today, the rest of the day, and into tomorrow as well.

SPEAKER_05 35:02

Yeah, it seems like the floor is busy. It is. Last night was great with the meet and greet, too, as kind of the kickoff. It was really good to see the the people that came for that and just see the excitement for everybody to be here.

SPEAKER_07 35:13

Yeah, well, we're happy to have you here. Now, Harper Love um is in adhesives. Tell me what you do for the corrugated industry.

SPEAKER_06 35:21

So we provide uh moisture-resistant resins and performance additives for the corrugated industry.

SPEAKER_07 35:26

Oh, awesome.

SPEAKER_06 35:27

And on on top of that, also we have uh industry-leading technical support that goes along with the additives that we sell to the marketplace.

SPEAKER_07 35:35

Yeah, so what kind of properties can your additives impart on the corrugated? Um It's okay, we'll we'll clean it up. Is that not the best question to ask? What's a better way to add that?

SPEAKER_06 35:51

That's a great question. Um I can say I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_07 35:54

That's okay.

SPEAKER_05 35:56

So so uh the the additive our additives are used in conjunction with starch to make the glue that holds the corrugated box together. Okay. So we in some some type of boxes need moisture resistance, need wet strength, uh, others need higher performance on the corrugator, so higher speed and and those type of things. So we we've got a lot of different you know range of products that we can tailor to to what the actual corrugator needs. So you know, a lot of your your uh Latin America customers, an example, do a lot of vegetable boxes. Those have a you know a lot of need for moisture resistance and hold together. Uh, but then you've got other folks that are making like a you know a box for Amazon or or e-commerce, and those just need to run fast.

SPEAKER_07 36:37

So Harper Love can help one corrugator do a bunch of different things.

SPEAKER_05 36:41

You bet, yes.

SPEAKER_07 36:42

Okay, that's pretty cool. Um, have you found that corrugated customers in general are getting more demanding about what they need out of their corrugated?

SPEAKER_06 36:51

Uh productivity is becoming big and a reduction in waste. So if we can help improve productivity and improve waste, reduce waste, it's huge in in the marketplace for uh not only us, but also our customers' savings.

SPEAKER_07 37:05

Yeah, I have been hearing that a lot, particularly regarding waste um at Corrugators, where that's something they're really trying to refine and better use their resources.

SPEAKER_06 37:16

Yeah. So we we market it when waste about 1% reduction in waste could be a million dollars to a customer's bottom line and helping them uh save money.

SPEAKER_07 37:25

Yeah, how does the customer even learn that that kind of opportunity is available to them?

SPEAKER_06 37:30

Um, you know, hopefully we get an opportunity to run uh a trial or with a customer or show them the the technical skills that we have to help them run their corrugator more efficient or better. Um and then you know um we can we can help them uh move forward in in reducing waste and productivity.

SPEAKER_07 37:50

That's one thing I think is great about a show like this because it finally connects the customers to the vendors so you can have those conversations, right?

SPEAKER_05 37:59

Oh, for sure. Yeah, it it puts a lot of the customers in one location, and a lot of our team is I think we have 19 people here. Wow. So we've kind of got every every person is here to pull in an expert or or bring in somebody for a specific conversation.

SPEAKER_08 38:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 38:14

The corrugating industry is a really wide range. You have some older equipment and some brand new equipment. Some, you know, some people that make a really high, highly specialized box and then more of a commodity. So we we really need to be able to cover the the full range there.

SPEAKER_07 38:29

Yeah, and I have you ever been surprised by something a customer asks you to help them do?

SPEAKER_05 38:34

Every day.

SPEAKER_07 38:37

All right, well, can you give me an example of something that maybe something that you brought forward to a customer that they didn't even know they could achieve?

SPEAKER_05 38:47

We we've got uh a new technology that that we've just been bringing out that that really gives you uh additional speed, it gives you reduced green bond or or it gives you more initial bond is another way to look at that. And we really have kind of been bringing that product or program out for a while, and just every time we run an evaluation, we learn more about what it can do. And so we've we've really kind of went at it with a you know, everything's got a cost component, everything has a performance component, but what we really didn't know is there's also a big quality component. Oh we we had a customer that that we were working with who, you know, it was it was really important to them to run the corrugator faster. It was really important that they had better bond. But one thing, and and of course, better bond leads to to better chemistry or sorry, better, better corrugator performance. But what we didn't realize is the the quality downstream, you know, for printing, converting, and and and on down that that we would would see a big gain from. And so we've we've been really excited with with every time we've we've run iterations of this program, we've we've learned more about it and and seen more more gains.

SPEAKER_07 39:52

Well, that's a great surprise to have, huh? It's better than you thought.

SPEAKER_05 39:55

Yeah, that's right. Yeah. We we have a lot of requests for uh for different boxes. You know, we we have customers that uh that do you know protein boxes, so you know, meat and chicken and things like that. Um we we have a a lot of customers that make banana boxes in Latin America. Um we we laugh about banana boxes, what do they hold? Uh bananas is a big thing. Oh, okay, okay.

SPEAKER_07 40:17

I'm gonna paint make a note of that.

SPEAKER_05 40:19

Yeah. So but but what's interesting is we um our marketing team and I, we we laugh about the journey of a banana box, you know, because it it's packed in the field, it goes into a refrigerated uh, you know, truck or something, it may go into re refrigerated storage, then it may get dried out again, you know, and and go out to to air, and then it gets back in a refrigerated truck, and then it goes in a grocery store. And this box has got to hold together through that whole cycle. Yeah. So it's it's really a you know, it you just think, well, it's a it's a banana box, but the reality is it's it's an extremely challenging application for for the type products that that we do.

SPEAKER_07 40:54

Well, I think that's amazing though. I mean, and that really is a journey right from out in the field, right to the consumer. And I think boxes are able to do that more now. I'm seeing that a lot more in the grocery store, that the shelf display is the corrugated box or part of the corrugated box that the product was shipped in.

SPEAKER_05 41:12

Yep, for sure. Yeah, point point of sale design is a is a bigger part of the industry than people realize. You know, there's a lot of a lot of arts and crafts go into it, you know, not just making the box, but but making the the point of sale, you know, showcase or container or whatever. It's there's and and there's some some things we get involved in that because the box has to fold, it has to hold together, it has to it has to be printable. You know, that's that's a big thing that that people don't realize. And and I learned this when I got here is you know, when you when you make a a double wall sheet, one side you actually make more rigid so you can print on it. So there's there's little things like that that that go into point of sale just the same.

SPEAKER_07 41:50

That's pretty cool. Now, this is a great segue because we're talking about you know what the box can do in point of sale. You have what I believe is the only booth on the floor right now that is actually made completely out of corrugated.

SPEAKER_05 42:05

It's the only one we've seen so far.

SPEAKER_06 42:06

Yeah, that's right.

SPEAKER_07 42:07

Tell me what you got in the booth that's made out of corrugated.

SPEAKER_06 42:10

Uh the entire the backdrop, the sidewalls, the tables, chairs, uh long tables out front, everything, everything in the booth is corrugated. The stools for the desks, we got the chairs and tables. Um and yeah, it's really it's really neat and unique.

SPEAKER_07 42:29

Yeah, you got some real nice um die-cut like board, kind of a scrim, kind of a border. It really dresses up the booth.

SPEAKER_05 42:36

Yeah, it's it really is awesome. Uh so the way we came about that is uh one of our customers in Bolivia, Impicar, uh, we were at a at a trade show in Bolivia and we had partnered with Impicar to produce uh a smaller booth, but but still had a lot of corrugated components to it. And and through the the period of the week, we we kind of got the idea of well, wouldn't it be great if we could do this, our booth here? Because we already had a booth design laid out and we were we were getting ready to start printing it. And so we we talked to them and we said, Well, how could you do it and how fast could you do it? Because we were getting close to the timeline here. And so they were a fantastic partner, their their artists got involved. We gave them kind of a napkin sketch, and then they came back with design, they they redid it a few times, and then they said, Yeah, we're gonna get to work, and then we we really kind of sweated it out, you know, is it gonna get done? Is it is it gonna get it looked good? Yeah, is it gonna look good? And and it we we put it up over the weekend. We I mean it was it was a bunch of adults doing puzzle, you know, because we're we're putting the whole booth together and it was a lot of fun. And but the highlight of that was the uh the general manager uh that from from Empicar is here with us. He he came to see the booth and to to spend some time with us and and see it and and set up. And and he he said, you know, I really appreciate you trusting us to to do this. And I just that was that was a really cool moment just to say, you know what? I I never really thought about it like that. But to him it was something that was really important that that we trusted him to be a partner to ship this booth halfway across the world and and um and and and bring it here for a show like this that's so important.

SPEAKER_07 44:12

I'll tell you, between you know suppliers and manufacturers, that trust is so important. Because those margins can be so big, you don't want to leave anything on the table. You have to trust that your vendor's doing their best for you. Um yeah, so I think that's that's really important.

SPEAKER_05 44:28

Yeah, yeah, it's great. Well, we're uh we're you know stepping up our social media on on the Harper Love side, and so we got lots of pictures of the booth and and lots of the booth in action. So so so check out Harper Love on LinkedIn. I think you'll you'll see what we've what we've got out there, and we're we're really excited about it.

SPEAKER_07 44:44

Well, I'm really glad you came here to the show with your all corrugated booth. Before you go, let me ask you one question that you can each answer. Okay. Is there something right now that's not made out of corrugated that you can see in the future might be made out of corrugated?

SPEAKER_05 45:04

You know, uh so this is what we're doing here with with our booth, but but but we have uh our our booth is made out of we have a lot of furniture in there that's that's made out of corrugated. And so there's uh there's lots I think you could do with the internal support and with uh you know parts of uh you know furniture or or home goods that that uh could certainly be made out of that.

SPEAKER_07 45:29

I see a big market there for something like dorm furniture, right? Where you want it to be sturdy but also replaceable, recyclable at the end of the semester, you can take it apart and bring it home for Christmas.

SPEAKER_05 45:41

Yeah, sure. Absolutely. I you know, and just the all the there's so many packaging opportunities, you know, anywhere that plastic's used, we should we should take a look at something sustainable like paper.

SPEAKER_07 45:52

I agree.

SPEAKER_05 45:53

Sure.

SPEAKER_07 45:54

I agree. Well, thank you guys so much, Jeff and Tyler. Thank you for coming by. It's been a pleasure to talk to you on Better Together.

SPEAKER_06 46:00

Thanks, Jimmy. Thanks for having us.

SPEAKER_07 46:05

My next guest is Teo Musalo. He's with Adara Pakos Oi. Did I say that correctly? It's a Finnish company, and you're both a manufacturer and a converter of corrugated. Is that correct?

SPEAKER_00 46:19

That's correct.

SPEAKER_07 46:20

Well, welcome to the show. Um, and let's start by telling us a little about what Adara does.

SPEAKER_00 46:27

So, just like you said, Tatadara is uh is a manufacturer and and converter of corrugated boxes uh and products. So we have uh both uh larger scale of products and then we have a smaller series in in displays and these point of sales products as as well. But in during last years we have been concentrating on those bigger runs, so medium-sized and and bigger sized volumes. Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_07 46:57

What kind of do you have a range of different corrugated products that you can make?

SPEAKER_00 47:03

So we have quite uh uh wide variety of of of uh grades. So we are going from the E-flute uh up to the double walls, and B and C is the is the is the top flute. And also uh uncoated, coated whites, brown, brown and man, you guys do it all. Yes. We have to do it in wide scale in in Finland.

SPEAKER_07 47:27

Yeah, so tell me a little about the corrugated industry in Finland as opposed maybe to North America. Do you see a big difference there?

SPEAKER_00 47:37

Well, uh it's it's uh hard for me to judge in in that uh uh perspective, but I think that in in uh in Finland it's uh it's a much more smaller uh business area, so we have to be, let's say, uh flexible and and and we have to have a a wide variety of of different options to offer for the customers.

SPEAKER_07 48:03

Um you're here and you're the s what we would call a CEO, which is a managing director at Adara.

SPEAKER_00 48:09

Yes.

SPEAKER_07 48:10

And you can you know learn what's happening around here, go back and tell your tell your staff, tell your team.

SPEAKER_00 48:15

Yeah, it's it's it's interesting and it's it's nice to be here. It's uh it's a nice exhibition. Uh it's the first day now, uh, but uh but it's it's uh it's getting uh closer to the end, so so but it it has been fun so far. And and yeah, I have uh actually uh meeting a couple of the uh other suppliers as well in the in the in the exhibition to to check the future plans that we are aiming for.

SPEAKER_07 48:43

Well, I love that you said Velmet is helping kind of sponsor you here and bringing you along as a partner, um, because you've been working with Velmet on something that's really not of it's it's not as well known in North America yet. I think Velmet is hoping to change that, but it's their IQ system. And tell me how you got started with um with that at Adara.

SPEAKER_00 49:10

Yeah, uh yeah, that's true. That uh we are actually uh Valmet is located uh in in in Tampere quite quite heavily their their unit there and and we are not far away from that. So that your neighbors uh like uh it's it's it's not uh wrong to say that it's only 40 kilometers between the the Walmet and Adaras uh places. So so yeah. Actually, we have been uh partners quite long. Uh the the Walmet has tested different uh uh single uh equipment uh in our uh factory when they have started to generate these these IQ systems for the for the corrugated industry. Uh and we went commercial some years ago. Uh we we started with the warp uh control and and these kind of things. Uh and now we are expanding the current system uh by adding the moisturize moisturizing uh control. Right. Moisture control as well to the system.

SPEAKER_07 50:17

Yeah, I was stopped. I had stopped by the Valmet IQ booth a little earlier, and they were telling me how the system is scalable, right? So it you can do it in components. So you started, you said with um warp.

SPEAKER_00 50:30

Yes, the warp or control. Yeah. So so the the one good thing is that yeah, you can you can buy all at once as a full system, but you can also do step by step. And in our case, because we believe that we have, let's say, been professionals in the in the corrugated manufacturing uh through the decades, but then we started to let's say check that what this system will bring, and and quite fast we saw some results.

SPEAKER_07 51:01

Nice, I like that. So that's a little bit of that Finnish circums circumspection, right? You let's see how the first one goes, then we'll add the second one, and then we'll add the third one. You like to see those results first.

SPEAKER_00 51:13

Yeah, and it's it's also good for the let's say um our sized company that that we we have a let's say learning curve in in during the process. So so and that's what we have seen. It's good for the operators as well, and we are really uh able to to get the things out of the system which is serving.

SPEAKER_07 51:38

So, what exactly do you and the operators get out of the system? What are some of the things you've been able to achieve?

SPEAKER_00 51:46

So, of course, the biggest thing is is the quality control in general, because the the system is measuring and it's adjusting as well. So we are getting the automated system. Uh in the past, it has been, let's say, operator-based, uh adjusting for for the for the about the feeling or about the outcome of the corrugator, and now it's warping up, now it's warping down, what should I do? And now Walmet is bringing this technology with which uh is really uh making the things uh in an automatic way.

SPEAKER_07 52:24

Right. And so does each component of the system then give information to the next component of the system? Do they work together?

SPEAKER_00 52:33

Yes, yes, that's that's the the the full system is taking care of the full line in general.

SPEAKER_07 52:41

Right. And how does that I'm thinking that that kind of information, depending on how it's presented, can make it easier or more difficult for an operator. Do you how do you what do your operators think?

SPEAKER_00 52:54

Uh it's it's uh of course it's a little bit confusing in the in the beginning, but uh but uh the the the most important thing is that the operator relies on the system and let the system do the job.

SPEAKER_07 53:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 53:08

Because the system knows what to do.

SPEAKER_07 53:10

Right.

SPEAKER_00 53:10

And and it it it knows it in the in the in the very beginning of the corrugating process. So it's more about decision making really than just Yes, and and changing the let's say the old habits to the new ones.

SPEAKER_07 53:26

Right. That can be a challenge. That can be a challenge. But you know, uh our keynote this morning was talking about how attractive technology can be to younger workers, especially. Do you find that in Finland as well?

SPEAKER_00 53:40

Yeah, at least it it it it it is changing. Uh but uh of course the Koro Kater is is a is a is a very traditional uh business. Uh I think that it will remain uh a traditional in the future as well, but of course the the uh the current uh uh current techniques which are available is is really being bringing the the value to the to the system. And these kind of automatization uh things are increasing heavily in the in the business area.

SPEAKER_07 54:17

Yeah, I agree. Is that helping a company like Adara? Is that helping you with your goal of scaling up?

SPEAKER_00 54:22

Yes, of course. And and also the the we are always looking uh the uh the possibilities where the processes are are as automatic as as uh as it can be.

SPEAKER_07 54:36

So you're here with Valmet sort of as a partner, right? You're also here just as a corrugator learning about you know what's new in the industry. In a in a supplier manufacturer relationship, what do you think are some of the important aspects of that relationship? What's important to have with your supplier?

SPEAKER_00 54:57

Uh it's it's very important to have uh a decent uh conversation between the both parties. Uh you have to rely on your partner and and and when it's uh let's say this kind of uh well-known partner, it's easier to rely on. Uh it's it's it's one of the key things that that you have to keep the good contacts and and whenever whatever comes up to the way, you have to take it to the table and and and run through it.

SPEAKER_07 55:29

But that's another thing with a supplier, a partner that's so well known, your expectations are high, right?

SPEAKER_00 55:37

That's true, that's true, and and but but it's also so that uh with with such a player, uh if we and as we know that Volmetis is uh uh more known on the on the paper side, but now they are bringing and they have been bringing this technology to the to the corrugating business.

SPEAKER_07 55:56

So I understand you've also bought a new facility. You so Adara is expanding.

SPEAKER_00 56:02

Yes, we actually uh in the beginning of of uh September we uh acquired uh or it was closed the the the uh acquisition of the smaller sheep converter in Finland. So yeah, that is actually one of the plans that we are further expanding our operations in Finland.

SPEAKER_07 56:22

Well, if you're expanding operations, you must be excited about the industry. What are you most excited about as a corrugated producer? What are you most excited about for the future of Corrugated?

SPEAKER_00 56:32

Uh I must say that uh I feel that this uh this uh fiber industry and corrugated industries, it it it's a little bit like a never-ending story. So so it it it it keeps alive, it it changes. Uh I have been now uh more than two decades uh dealing with uh corrugated boxes and folding box boards. So so uh it's uh it's always changing.

SPEAKER_07 57:01

I like that. I like that. It's a never-ending story. Well, thank you for telling a little bit of that story here today. It was nice to meet you, Temo.

SPEAKER_00 57:09

Yeah, thanks. It it was a pleasure.

SPEAKER_07 57:13

And now on Better Together, I'd like to welcome Rick Pooch. He's with National Steel Rule, and he has many roles here at Supercore Expo. And I don't know if we'll have time to talk about all of them, but we're gonna hit a few at least. Um, thank you for being on the show, Rick.

SPEAKER_01 57:29

Thank you, Jan. I'm very glad to be here.

SPEAKER_07 57:31

So the first thing I wanted to ask you about is this course that you were teaching for us. It's right here on site, and it was in two parts. And the course is called Effective Methods to Maximize Die Cutting Productivity.

SPEAKER_01 57:44

Yes. That's a mouthful. It is, it is, and this is the third year that we've done the course in the past two years, it was a one-day, eight hour course. And um actually when I was asked to do this originally and assemble it, uh, which was in San Antonio, um, I I wanted to spread it over two days because I knew I was going to be offering so much information, and I knew in order to cover it I would be hurrying and going fast. But we couldn't commit to two days, so we did one uh one day, but I'm jamming like twelve hours of data into a into a one-day session. Then from the reviews of the past couple years, Cleveland, I think as well, and San Antonio, it was said that hey, uh we would prefer to have it on a weekday and not compete on weekends with other events. Yeah. Um it's hard to get away, it's hard for people to commit resources and travel on the weekend. So we agreed to split the course into two four-hour sessions. So today, um, this course this year rather was uh was not uh duplicated on on Tuesday from Monday, it was a continuation of uh was very well attended. We had a wide range of uh people. We had uh a pa company from a paper mill, we had actually I think it was an OEM equipment person there, there was several box plants, large and small. We had a lot of representation from Canada. Um it was it was good. I was very pleased. We I think we capped it at 40. Um, so they usually expect maybe 24 or something like this would be a decent turnout. We had 40, and I talked to people on the floor uh at the exhibition hall that wanted to get in but couldn't get in. But I think today there was about six or seven more showed up. So on those chairs. Yeah, we we did. We were pulling chairs, yeah.

SPEAKER_07 59:20

Well, you know, with even with a diverse group like that, if there's one thing in the corrugated industry that everybody's looking for, it's productivity, right? Those productivity gains.

SPEAKER_01 59:30

It is. And and and what I try to do to to to to get this information to the class is to break it into you know three things. I mean, you got the substrate, which is the corrugated paper, you got the equipment, and then you have the tooling. And um, yeah, so we were getting a lot of feedback from some people and understand that the three have to work in harmony to get an understanding. And I actually kick it off going a step further and saying, you know, if you're producing cartons for the corrugated industry, look outside your own four walls. Go to your customer, understand how they use it. Because if you understand how they have to take your box, which is flat, fold it, assemble it, and fulfill it with their product, you might find there's a better way you should be producing it.

SPEAKER_07 1:00:09

Wow, yeah. You always have to look for that opportunity, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:00:12

You do.

SPEAKER_07 1:00:13

It's a very competitive industry.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:14

It is, it is, but and that well, I hats off to the people who took the time and spent the money to come and do it.

SPEAKER_07 1:00:19

Yeah. Okay, that's that's great to hear. Um, another rule I wanted to talk to you about on the podcast today is Tappy Press has a new book out. It's called Corrugating Defect and Remedy Manual. Now, what was your contribution for this book?

SPEAKER_01 1:00:37

Yes, I was contacted to do this. Um I think it was Marianne Cawthon that originally contacted me with this, and then she asked me actually to be editor-in-chief, and and and it was something I didn't want to overcommit and do something. I didn't really know what that meant. Um other than there would be a lot of responsibility, and I wasn't gonna let her down. And so as I started to as I started to read the the the past um edition, I realized how much regarding die cutting was was old. And at first I was a little apprehensive to change because I didn't want to offend prior authors. To be honest, some of them are so old they're probably no longer with us.

SPEAKER_08 1:01:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:12

And so that's how that's how dated some of the material was. So what I did was realized, okay, I'm gonna rewrite the entire section. So my contribution was I rewrote section three on die cutting, but at the same time, she asked me if I could help her with some of the other areas. So I did. So I brought several other um contributors in on different sections, actually five in total.

SPEAKER_07 1:01:31

Yeah, well that's why a lot of these Tappy Press books you'll see. This one is seventh edition.

SPEAKER_08 1:01:37

Yes.

SPEAKER_07 1:01:37

So the you know, it was years ago when the they first put the book together, but it's constantly being updated by our volunteers. And I think actually it's good that you found the outdated information because that's exactly what we need to replace, right? Things are changing so rapidly.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:51

They are changing rapidly, and everyone's complaining about the same thing, is they don't have the uh this the skill sets. And and I could tell you this is one of the finest books in print that I've seen. I've been in this industry 48 years. Wow. And I haven't even got a chance. I mean, because I obviously been involved in it, I read in detail my section, but I'm very eager to see the rest of it. It is it's an amazing publication. It'll be so beneficial. Everywhere for the it's a very it's a fair price, it's a good product, and it's an easy read.

SPEAKER_07 1:02:18

Well, it looks terrific. Um the the book looks really good. And so who would need a book like this?

SPEAKER_01 1:02:25

I believe that any any converting plant uh should use uh should should get several copies of this and give it to their to their superintendents. And and because you you don't you wouldn't leave it to just to any of the multiple shift operators, it may get misplaced. What I would do is give this to the super the plant superintendents and then and then they can understand that when they get a complaint about things or and they'll use it as an educational manual, is what I'm trying to say.

SPEAKER_08 1:02:51

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:52

So I I really think a a couple copies in in plants. If you have if you have six machine centers, you know, maybe get three copies. If you have uh two uh four machine centers, just get two. But you need you can't have one over six because people are gonna refer to this. I want them to this is something that should be used.

SPEAKER_07 1:03:09

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:10

Um there was a company, it was an ink company years ago that was they had a really good uh thing that they put press side regarding uh the conditions of ink. You start losing color, it could be pH, these are the adjustment you made. And it was a very, very wonderful job by that company to do that. And this is very similar to that. It gives you a a cause and it gives you a solution for that cause directly across in a table format with pictures.

SPEAKER_07 1:03:33

Well, even if you have s the sixth edition, you might want to upgrade to the seventh edition.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:39

I would there's no comparison. There's no comparison. Yeah, it's yep. This one here has been turbocharged.

SPEAKER_07 1:03:44

Well, that oh I love that. Well, I have a quick question for you regarding that. You said there were some things that you were able to update. What what has been one of the biggest changes from the sixth edition to something that's been developed that you updated for the seventh edition edition?

SPEAKER_01 1:04:00

Um I'd say the thing that comes out right away would be flatbed die cutting. You know, back party the last time this had been edited in flatbed die-cutting, there was a lot of uh hand-fed machines, such as the Mealy is a specific type of machine, the Thompson, which is a clamshell. There were references to that. And and and some of the Auto Platinum, which would be um a company like Bop's produces those types of machines. Some of the technology has changed significantly. Basically, the first two machines are no longer with us very often. So I wanted to get more modern equipment and with the current um offerings that they that these these machines uh have. Yeah, the the the equipment and so it's more updated to today's machinery.

SPEAKER_07 1:04:39

Well, I think what's interesting is that North America as a as a rule or a habit has typically had older sort of capital equipment in place.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:51

That is true until recently.

SPEAKER_07 1:04:53

Until recently.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:54

You are so true.

SPEAKER_07 1:04:56

So there is so much going on right now in terms of expansion, adding lines, um, combining operations, um, just smaller operations who want to have new capabilities. There's so much new equipment being added in North America.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:09

That's so true. I mean, and I'll change my from three books to six. You should get six books because I will tell you I will tell you that that the amount of money spent on capital equipment in the last ten years has been unbelievable. The amount of knowledge that has left the industry in the last ten years is unbelievable. So we're going two different directions. A lot of these companies are public companies, and when when you invest that much money in capital equipment and don't get the return, you you have to have accountability for it. And a lot of it is training, and it can't be finger pointing. I believe a lot of it's just they really don't know where to go. So until you know a lot of people are are guilty till proven innocent because they can't they can't identify where the problem is. This book will help you identify that problem.

SPEAKER_07 1:05:50

Right. Right. And it's it's not just corrugating defects, it's corrugating defect remedy. Correct.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:57

Well said.

SPEAKER_07 1:05:58

Well, that's really interesting. Because now what we're talking about is at the heart of a lot of issues in the industry, and that is knowledge capture, right?

SPEAKER_08 1:06:07

It is.

SPEAKER_07 1:06:08

So we have this online course or the uh on-site course that you led for us. And you were telling me before that um that's knowledge that not only the participants can take here on site, but that that's knowledge they can also refer to later, right? Yes. How do they how how do they do that?

SPEAKER_01 1:06:26

It's digital. So the the all the course materials will be uploaded to an FT FTP site or somewhere where they can they can download them. You know, in the past we used to give them USB drives with all the data. It was nice for them to walk away. Right. But the problem is a lot of companies don't allow those those types of devices to be loaded into their computers, so they make it available on the web. But yeah, it's it's a series of movies and I had tremendous amount of slides, but I use a lot of pictures in my training. I'm not I'm not the type of uh person who who just puts something up and reads it for beta. It's sort of a reminder of okay, this is what we're going to now talk about. And today I can tell you we had a lot of interaction for the people. We could have easily, you know, won a whole day just today on on the interaction. And that's when you get the most interest because everyone stays awake, they're they're really engaged. They're engaged. But I'd be honest, I looked around the room, I've done a lot of this. I could tell you these guys were engaged. They I believe they were very, very happy with what they got.

SPEAKER_07 1:07:19

Yeah, there's just a great energy on the floor, isn't there?

SPEAKER_01 1:07:21

That's oh, compared to such a a great thing to see since you know the pre you know, obviously COVID and 2021.

SPEAKER_07 1:07:27

So before you go, I'll ask you just a quick question about one more thing you're doing on site here, and that is you were a judge for the box making Olympics. I was. How did that go this year?

SPEAKER_01 1:07:39

It was good. Unfortunately, we didn't have the number of entries that we've had in the past. I think Laura um Halek told me that that we were one hundred less than what we were in 2021, which is you know, it's a little disappointed. The quality of the entries were great. Um I was a structural judge, so we have drop structural judges and and and graphic judges. And I I've been doing this for many, maybe 20 years. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_07 1:08:01

There's so many cool categories.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:03

So, yes, there are, so I've got to see it. But yes, this year, once again, didn't disappoint with the quality of the um entries. I would have liked to see more of them, though.

SPEAKER_07 1:08:11

That's really cool. Well, thank you so much. I'm so glad you were here at Supercore Expo. I'm so glad you found so many ways to be involved, and we're capturing your knowledge, which is really important.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:23

Yeah, I appreciate that. I believe me, I learned from everyone else as well.

SPEAKER_07 1:08:28

I'm so glad you tuned in for this special episode recorded at Supercore Expo 2024 in Orlando, Florida. I loved speaking with Bowman, Jason, Christine, Jeff, Tyler, Timu, and Rick. Big thanks to them all for taking the time to drop in and share their perspectives with me and with you. If you've not already done so, please make sure to give a listen to our first SuperCore Expo episode, where we meet more core gating professionals willing to share their experiences. Check it out. And thanks for listening to Better Together.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:14

Hello everyone, this is Larry Montague, president and CEO of Tappy, the pulp, paper, packaging, tissue, and converter industry's go to resource for news, industry trends, and technical and management information. We hope you enjoy today's Better Together podcast. And remember, there are two types of people in our industry Tappy members and those who should be. Have a great day.