Jeff Gilmore, Vice President
Premier Paper Converting Machinery
Each spring, the AICC (Association of Independent Corrugated Converters) brings together the people who make boxes and partitions. This year’s AICC Spring Meeting 2026 was in Carlsbad, California, and was attended by a varied crowd with large and small company representatives, converters from the U.S. and Canada, CEOs, and plant managers. All of us shared honest conversations about our industry.
I joined PPCM as Vice President late last November, so this was my first AICC Spring Meeting. I attended with Jay Mumper, PPCM’s longtime industry veteran and recently retired VP, who introduced me to the network he’s built for decades. The result was something I couldn’t have done on my own, going into a room of people who already know and trust the company I now represent. Here’s what I learned.
Key Takeaways:
- The AICC 2026 Spring Meeting brought together customers, peers, and industry leaders in the corrugated conversion industry.
- Labor availability is the industry’s defining challenge. Automation and improved training methods are helping shore up the gap.
- Productivity is the competitive differentiator in a flat market. With limited growth, the companies gaining ground are finding ways to get higher output and more uptime.
- Proactive service, planned maintenance, and retrofit upgrades help manufacturers stay ahead of aging control systems.
Industry Networking at the AICC Spring Meeting
The AICC Spring Meeting is a great opportunity for business leaders to come together, to network, and make connections. There were discussions on leadership development, automation, and AI, but some of the best conversations happened in between sessions, on the golf course, and over dinner (although I did not golf).
For me, making those connections was especially meaningful. PPCM’s customers are spread across the country. Usually, if I want to connect with a CEO or plant president, it requires a lot of travel, scheduling, and coordination. In Carlsbad, we had a chance to have those same conversations in one place.
I met face-to-face with CEOs and company presidents who we’ve had as customers for years. Going with Jay gave the introductions immediate value, credibility, and warmth, which was a strong start. It’s an example of what industry events are meant to do at their best.
The overall feeling throughout the conference was positive—approaching industry questions cautiously and practically, with optimism. Yes, there were plenty of discussions about economic unpredictability and how company leaders can reassure customers about the road ahead. But the vibe was forward-focused with many folks who’ve navigated difficult markets before and are ready to do it again, whatever may come.
The Industry’s Labor Question Isn’t Going Away
If there was one dominant topic in the floor conversations at the conference, it was labor. Particularly, the persistent difficulty of finding and keeping skilled manufacturing talent and what that retention means for how companies run their operations.
It’s getting harder and harder to find experienced operators. Entry-level hires come in with less background than they used to in the past. As companies grow, the math around headcounts and staffing gets complicated quickly. For most companies, it’s around the 50-employee threshold, where labor law obligations change in ways that impact compensation structure.
Many manufacturers shared the same practical approach of investing in automation to support their operations in the future. Fully automatic machines let operations scale and increase output without necessarily having to increase headcount.
But automation alone doesn’t entirely resolve the issue. Machines must be user-friendly too. Operators are hired with less and less experience. That reality is shaping what customers need from their machinery. Simple, easy-to-use interfaces aren’t just in the “nice-to-have” category anymore. They’re part of the purchasing decision. For PPCM, it’s a design challenge as well as a sales issue—we make machines that both skilled veterans and newer operators can get up and running quickly and efficiently.
Of note, reshoring wasn’t as much of a topic for the industry. Corrugated and partition products are regional by nature, so the trade dynamics of other manufacturing sectors don’t come up here as frequently.
AI Is Present, But Still Mostly Theoretical
AI is the buzz just about everywhere, and it came up quite a bit in the conference. We had a few dedicated workshop sessions and exploratory discussions.
Most of the talk centered on what the technology could do in the future, versus what it’s doing on today’s floor. For administrative tasks like spreadsheet work, email drafting, and document organization, there’s practical use for AI too. On the graphic design side, AI is starting to make inroads, especially for customers who require logo printing and custom branding on packaging.
For PPCM’s core business of building and servicing partition machinery, the conversation is important, but slightly less urgent. Machine codes aren’t being generated fast enough or in high-enough volume to make AI-assisted automation an immediate demand…at least for now.
That’s not to dismiss AI as crucial. The technology fits in manufacturing and is critical for the sector as a whole. As a niche manufacturer whose machines run for decades and whose value proposition is the precision, reliability, and support for what we build, the human element is integral.
Productivity Is the Competitive Differentiator
In a market that isn’t rapidly expanding and in which every manufacturer is competing for the same business, the primary differentiator has become productivity. Companies that are getting ahead are those that find better ways to do more using what they have.
For PPCM, this framing shapes how we think about our products and our customer relationships. A machine that’s faster to learn, easier to maintain, and less prone to unanticipated downtime is a better product and investment. It’s a genuine competitive advantage for customers. And that’s where our new proactive service model comes in.
From Reactive to Proactive: PPCM’s Service Evolution
At PPCM, we’re seeing this shift in need for support. It isn’t about the machines as much as it’s about the way we support them and those who use them over time.
In most situations, service is reactive. When something stops working, a customer calls, and we respond. That model works for most situations, but we wanted to offer our customers more.
For me, this is personal, and it’s how I’ve approached sales throughout my career. We need to be more of an extension to our customers than we are a supplier. We need to be that partner. For the customers who let us come in and work with them, we definitely have the ability to provide them with some options to make their businesses run better.
At PPCM, we know that sudden downtime is one of the most costly situations for your machinery. Production might be down for days; sometimes, emergency travel is needed for technicians. The disruption may be tough to absorb in such a tight-margin environment.
We’re answering the call with our tiered service and support programs that include preventative maintenance, equipment evaluations, and retraining for operators. We know it’s better to catch problems long before they become crises. We have dedicated personnel to specifically develop and promote these programs, and rollout is underway with our new machine customers now.
Mechanical things fail. Regardless of how well they’re built, failure will happen at some point, so the best way to handle it is to plan ahead as well as provide support to ensure the continuity of our customers’ businesses.
We recently secured a retrofit order, which was a meaningful signal that customers are in line with the idea of proactive upgrades. Many of our machines are mechanically sound, even after 20 or 25 years. But the control systems that run them need modernization and updating. Being ahead of that need is good for the machine and good for our customers’ bottom line.
Where Industry Growth Is Coming from Based on the Conference
To share some candid observations and takeaways from the conference, one major point was which end-markets are moving in which directions.
Automotive seems to continue as a bright spot. Consumer products remain steady. The beer and wine segment is seeing a declining demand, due to wider variations in consumer drinking habits (which may not reverse quickly).
For manufacturers who are wondering where to invest their energy and resources, the message from the AICC Spring Meeting 2026 was consistent. Automation continues to offer the clearest short-term path to better efficiency and cost control. The financial environment of our industry is more favorable than many may realize.
Current tax law permits businesses to depreciate capital equipment investments in a single year (rather than spreading the deduction over time). So, for manufacturers needing automation upgrades, that can mean meaningful savings. There are also SBA programs and funding sources to help them offset the upfront cost.
I came away from the AICC Spring Meeting with a strong appreciation for what the AICC has built. The organization put particular thought into improving the experience of first-time attendees. They were assigned ambassadors to help them make connections. For me, walking in as PPCM’s new VP and walking out with a stronger customer network, it was the kind of event our industry needs.
At PPCM, we think inside the box. And right now, there’s a lot happening inside the box worth paying attention to.