Brook + Whittle — Matching the Right Technology with the Right Work · Eric Rivard
Brook + Whittle has grown into one of North America’s leading packaging companies, producing labels, shrink sleeves, and flexible packaging across a network of 12 operations.
But scale alone isn’t the strategy.
Each facility has different capabilities and specializations — from flexo and digital to short-run, long-run, e-commerce, and specialty applications. The opportunity, according to Eric from Brook + Whittle, is to use that network intelligently and match each customer’s work with the technology, location, and production method that makes the most sense.
At Labelexpo Americas in Chicago, Morten B. Reitoft meets Eric Rivard at the Gallus and Heidelberg booth to talk about Brook + Whittle’s continued investments and its long-standing relationship with Gallus.
That relationship is now expanding with the addition of a Gallus One.
The decision wasn’t simply about buying another press. Brook + Whittle worked with Gallus over several months, testing real production jobs and evaluating where the technology would best fit within the group’s manufacturing network. Existing experience with Gallus Labelmaster presses also played an important role in the decision.
For Brook + Whittle, digital, flexo, and hybrid technologies aren’t competing philosophies. They are tools that allow the company to choose the most productive and cost-effective manufacturing route for each application while maintaining the color consistency and quality demanded by major brands.
Sustainability is becoming another increasingly important part of those conversations. As Extended Producer Responsibility requirements develop across the US, Brook + Whittle sees an opportunity to help brands make better packaging decisions around recyclability, materials, and long-term packaging strategies.
And behind all of this sits another important element: automation.
With multiple production sites, automating prepress, production workflows, and data exchange is essential if Brook + Whittle wants to optimize capacity across the entire network rather than focusing on each plant individually.
In this INKISH film, we talk about growth through acquisition, multi-site production, Gallus technology, digital versus flexo, sustainability, automation, and why the future isn’t necessarily about choosing one printing technology over another.
It’s about choosing the right technology for the right work.
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Wed September 16th
Grand Rapids Label — 142 Years Old, Still L...
Grand Rapids Label has been in business for 142 years. That means the company has obviously done quite a few things right. But for President Bill, respecting that history doesn't mean protecting everything the company has always done. It means understanding what made Grand Rapids Label successful — while continuously challenging how the business can become better. Bill became the first president from outside the founding family just three years ago, and today he is helping prepare Grand Rapids Label for its next chapter, where data, automation, digital production, AI, and increasingly sophisticated software become important tools alongside the knowledge and experience of its people. One of those investments is CERM. And the road to CERM wasn't completely straightforward. Grand Rapids Label had previously selected another major MIS platform, but during implementation the management team came to a difficult conclusion: it wasn't the right solution. So they stopped. Starting again wasn't easy, but the experience also gave the company a much clearer understanding of what it actually needed from an MIS partner. With CERM, Grand Rapids Label took a phased approach. First, focus on what absolutely has to work. Then build from there. That is particularly important for a company heavily involved in automotive and direct food-contact applications, where regulations, certifications, traceability, supply chains, and customer requirements leave little room for disruption. Today, CERM is becoming much more than an administrative system. Combined with Power BI and production technology, the data is being used by cross-functional teams throughout Grand Rapids Label to continuously identify opportunities for improvement — whether that means reducing order-entry time, improving estimating, optimizing press utilization, or finding smarter ways of producing work. Those teams meet every week. The objective isn't simply to collect more data. It is to turn data into better decisions. And Bill sees another important consequence: good data can allow management to decentralize decision-making. Give people trustworthy information, establish the right guardrails, and employees can make more decisions themselves without being micromanaged. That also changes how the ROI of an MIS should be considered. Unlike a printing press, where productivity and return can often be calculated relatively directly, the value of an MIS appears throughout the organization — in faster processes, better costing, higher utilization, improved profitability, stronger decision-making, and ultimately in the culture of the company. In this INKISH film, Morten B. Reitoft talks with Bill about 142 years of Grand Rapids Label, becoming the company's first president from outside the family, lessons from an MIS implementation that didn't work, the move to CERM, Power BI, continuous improvement, AI, and why technology should ultimately give people more freedom to make better decisions. Because staying successful for 142 years doesn't mean doing things the same way for 142 years.