Sonoco has announced a new research partnership with Clemson University: the Sonoco FRESH (Food Research Excellence for Safety and Health) initiative will develop new technologies and new forms of packaging to optimize the fresh food lifecycle. “Sonoco is committed to serving fresh brands, using packaging to tackle the challenges they face,” said Sonoco President and CEO Jack Sanders. “Optimizing fresh food packaging to extend shelf life and maintain quality makes fresh produce more accessible to communities, and helps brands and retailers extend sales opportunities and eliminate food waste. “Each year, the food industry loses $15.6 billion due to food spoilage at retail. Modifying packaging design to extend shelf life by even one day can recover $1.8 billion of that loss – while feeding more people and reducing waste to landfills.” To establish the multi-disciplinary hub for innovation and research to advance fresh food packaging and distribution, Sonoco will contribute $1.725 million over 5 years. The Company will also sponsor business-driven research projects totaling $1 million over that period. Sonoco FRESH is an extension of the partnership that created the Sonoco Institute of Packaging Design and Graphics at Clemson. Click Read More below for additional information.

Pregis proudly showcased its packaging innovations to 50,000 industry professionals at ProMat 2023, the largest material handling, logistics, and supply chain show in the world. Coming out of the event, three critical packaging trends will add tremendous value to company fulfillment operations. Automation - E-commerce demand is raising volumes in warehouses, and to keep up, companies have no choice but to implement automation. This technology is being integrated more often, and the runway for an ROI is shorter than ever. Recyclability and Recycled Content - Protective packaging is being truly engineered with the environment in mind. Businesses, and their customers, are increasingly supporting a circular economy. Customer Experience - Protecting goods from the rigors of shipping continues to be a main proponent of customer experience, but as the world continues to lean towards direct-to-consumer offerings, companies are looking for more ways to stand out.

“Our first quarter results demonstrated the strength of the new Sonoco as our global team achieved record top-line and adjusted EBITDA performance, growing 31% and 38%, respectively, while adjusted earnings per share rose 23% despite higher-than-expected interest expense, taxes and the negative impact of currency exchange rates,” said Howard Coker, President and Chief Executive Officer. “Consumer Packaging segment sales grew 83% and adjusted EBITDA jumped 127%. We completed the first phase of the integration of Eviosys as it has been rebranded Sonoco Metal Packaging EMEA and we drove strong synergies across the global Metal Packaging enterprise. In addition to the benefit of the Eviosys acquisition, our Metal Packaging U.S. business achieved approximately 10% growth in organic volume/mix in the quarter. Our Industrial Paper Packaging segment improved adjusted EBITDA by 6% and EBITDA margin by approximately 200 basis points driven by year-over-year improvement in price/cost and productivity.” Coker continued, “After the close of the quarter, we successfully completed an important step in our transformation to a simpler, stronger and more sustainable company with the sale of our Thermoformed and Flexibles Packaging business. We have used after-tax proceeds of approximately $1.56 billion to significantly reduce debt and strengthen our balance sheet. Today, our net leverage ratio is below 4.0X Net Debt/Adjusted EBITDA and we remain on track to achieve our targeted net leverage of 3.0X to 3.3X by the end of 2026.”