Alpha Plastics: Going Global With World Class Manufacturing

Alpha Plastics, St. Louis, MO, is a privately held manufacturer of both stock and custom packaging in high density polyethylene (HDPE) and polyethylene terephthalate (PET). The company has evolved into a major supplier of bottles and jars to nutritional supplement companies and has recently expanded into personal care packaging. Dave Spence, Alpha’s president and CEO, has engineered the company’s growth from a niche blow molder to a $27 million global organization.

Alpha Plastics had its beginnings in 1969, focusing exclusively on extrusion blow molding. After years of slow growth, Alpha was put up for sale in 1985. According to Randy Kotoucek, manager of marketing and product development, that is when David Spence came into the picture. “Dave intuitively knew that this small company could grow if there was an investment in improving quality, increasing product offerings and pushing the envelope for new opportunities,” he said. The first round of company ­ad­vancements came in the form of the first injection blow molding machine in 1989. Next on the list was the acquisition of an extra 35,000 square foot manufacturing and warehouse facility. In 1997, the improvements continued with Alpha’s first production of PET packing and by 1998 another 100,000 square foot addition for a warehouse/distribution center was needed. The company grew under Mr. Spence’s guidance from sales of under $500,000 in 1985 to over $10 million by 1998.

Continuing the theme of progress, Mr. Spence also expanded into a greater depth of products. Currently, Alpha Plastics manufactures a variety of products, including wide mouth rounds, jars, oblongs, squares and other styles; it also maintains an inventory of closures, cotton and rayon coil. Alpha has limitless color matching capabilities and can produce most packaging in a wide variety of colors, including metallic PET.

The additional manufacturing space has allowed Alpha to significantly augment its standard product offerings. “We are expanding our size range to include larger PET wide mouth containers; we’re also launching PET narrow mouth rounds for our expansion into the personal care and pharmaceutical markets and a newoval line of PET for the personal care,” said Mr. Kotoucek. He ad­ded, “We are looking into develop­ing new proprietary packaging and systems for both containers and closures, in line with our annual goal to offer more options to our customers. At this time we have approximately five patents sitting on the table to be approved on various products. We are planning more patents for vitamins and nutritional product packaging.”

Also notable has been the recent global expansion of Alpha Plastics into international markets. Mr. Kotoucek stated, “We are a people company, we’re flexible and considerate to our customers’ needs. If they need us on the other side of the globe, then that’s where we’re going to be.” This tenacity to better serve its clients has lead Alpha Plastics to add distributors in Ca­nada, Puerto Rico, France, Germany, Israel, Italy, The Netherlands, South Africa, Turkey and the U.K.

Alpha Plastics has also grown in the U.S. with the recent acquisition of Gutmann Plastics, Brooklyn, NY, a manufacturer of HDPE and PET containers for nutritional, pharmaceutical and personal care products. The acquisition will add additional extrusion and injection blow molding capacity and a 100,000 square foot manufacturing/warehouse facility on the East Coast. With the addition of Gutmann, projected annual sales for Alpha Plastics are $27 million.

According to Mr. Kotoucek, “For the future, the company expects to sustain annual growth of at least 15%,” a rate which, he said, Alpha Plastics has greatly exceeded for the past four years. “In the coming year we want to see a smooth transition into our new facility, the addition of new equipment where it’s needed and a focus on manufacturing processes. In the next five years, we plan to focus on procedures and developing new proprietary packaging systems for both containers and closures. We are also looking to offer more options to our customers and seeking new opportunities, be it in acquisitions or new markets.”

Mr. Kotoucek summed it up, “Alpha Plastics has reinvented itself in the last 16 years; we’re no longer a one trick pony. We are dedicated to building a world class company that doesn’t forget its roots or the customers that have made this company so successful.”—J.C.
Alpha Plastics
10315 Page Industrial Boulevard
St.Louis, MO 63132
Telephone: 314-427-4300;
800-421-4772
Fax: 314-427-5445
Website: www.alphaplastic.com