We can fly high today

Editorial by Stefano Lavorini

Like it or not, packaging is the new universal language of the consumer society, thanks to its ability to speak to many, to everybody, albeit with always different accents.

The meaning can change.. but the vehicle - packaging – remains, in all events, a powerful communication tool which may talk of beauty, of something intangible such as a taste, a perfume, or then again, a hope, which beyond the ugliness of the times, takes us to a better world, confounding the utilitarian function of the product to give it the unsuspected characteristics of desire.

For material and machinery manufacturers, packaging should be, therefore, a means to “fly high”, to do business combining economy and ecology, profit and attention to social issues. There is an increasing number of companies that prioritise their sustainable development commitment, overcoming a partial approach to ESG questions, still too often focused on the environmental aspect and often reduced to a valuation of the carbon footprint, without considering the social and governance challenges and their interconnections.

In this scenario, there are some who continue to invent their own “lightness” to be able to “fly”, like Boxmarche which, for exactly 20 years has been drawing up its Living Company Report, the reporting document that integrates the financial statement and the sustainability report. And this is despite the fact that it’s a paper converting company, with a 2022 production value of just over 14 million euros …

Boxmarche’s way of doing business is explained very clearly in the letter of its chairman, Tonino Dominici to the company’s stakeholders, which states, among other things, that:

«The modern business organization must be subdivided into three well-distinct categories according to roles and functions. Entrepreneurial capital responsible for strategic decisions, managerial organizational capital with operational management skills […] and relational capital, which comprises the set of intangible resources dedicated to relationships with stakeholders. It’s clear that a structure with these attributes and with a high level of specialisation is the prerogative of medium-large companies. In the case of small enterprises, instead, these attributes are developed in an embryonic way and concentrated in a single figure, that of the entrepreneur/owner […]. It is, however, true that the concentration of control and management powers, as well as strategic responsibility in the hands of a single figure could, on the one hand, have considerable advantages of a “short chain” of command (flexibility, timeliness in decision-making and the absence of conflicts), on the other hand, however, it could be an obstacle to the organizational-cultural change necessary to keep the company in step with the technological progress that global competition requires. Aware of this, Boxmarche launched some years ago the “Fabbrica Comune” (Shared Factory) project, a development path for the expertise, skills and responsibility of its workforce, which aims for a transformation towards a participatory-matrix organizational model, favouring team management».

These concepts are reiterated, with different emphases by Claudio Carattoni, CEO of SIT Group (flexible packaging), invited to contribute to the Living Company Report.

His piece refers to the transformations that have taken SIT from a turnover in 1994 of around 10 million euros with 50 people, to over 235 million euros in 2022 generated in 5 production sites with a workforce of almost 800, underlining how everything has obviously changed, but not spirit driving the company which has gradually become more embedded in its organizational culture. As a result, concludes Carattoni:

«The wish I make […] is that our work experience does not become a mere need for economic sustenance, but is part of our harmony of life in which, in a positive climate of trust, each of us is able to contribute with passion what they do best, respectful of our fragile planet and knowing we can count on each other. And that every day each one of us can feel to be in the right place! ».

If this does not mean flying high, you tell me.