Say What? A quick word with Steve Baker

Why did you decide move into pouches?

When you look at other packaging products, corrugated, flexible packaging, folding cartons, they all need lots of space. We are in the expensive south east and this tends to focus the mind. This is why companies producing corrugated and so are in the north. And others are good at producing shrinkwraps. We think that the refill market is set to explode. It is vast in India and we have to think about how many labels pouches will replace.

Do you think others will follow your lead?

There are serious barriers to entry for a label converter to move into pouches: the equipment is expensive and there are lots of quality checks to think about – which we now know about. This does not mean there is no price competition there is, which is why we want to develop a niche within this niche with different finishes, foils and varnishes. Customers don’t often want this, we are ready when they do.

What keeps you going?

I love to invest back into the business and to find the next growth area. Others tend to stick to what they know and like doing. Now that the boys are in the business we have a strong management team going forwards with a hunger to develop and a commitment to the business. Had the boys not been interested we might have had to think differently.