Chairman and CEO
Green Bay Packaging | Green Bay
William Kress represents the third generation of Kress family leadership of Green Bay Packaging Inc., a pulp and paper company founded by his grandfather, George Kress in 1933.
Kress has spent his entire career at GBP, having joined the family business as a sales trainee in 1979 after college. Kress held several leadership roles before becoming president in 1995. He was named CEO in 2001 and later elected chairman in 2019.
Reporting more than $2 billion in annual sales, GBP has about 5,300 employees across its 41 locations in 16 states. The vertically integrated manufacturing company includes corrugated container plants, a folding carton facility, recycled and virgin linerboard mills, pressure-sensitive label roll stock plants, specialty converting operations, timberlands and a sawmill facility.
In 2024, GBP acquired SMC Packaging Group, a Springfield, Missouri-based provider of corrugated packaging, point-of-purchase displays, protective shipping cartons, and ancillary packaging supplies.
The company also recently broke ground for a new 270,000-square-foot facility in Germantown, which is expected to create another 20 jobs in the area.
Kress currently serves on the boards of Green Bay Packaging, the Green Bay Packers and the De Pere Cultural Foundation and advisory boards for Associated Bank and Junior Achievement.
Kress received the Rotary Club of Green Bay’s Free Enterprise Award in 2016, was named TAPPI/PIMA Executive of the Year in 2022 and received the Environmental Citizen of the Year Award by the Clean Water Action Council of Northeast Wisconsin in 2022.
Education: Bachelor’s, University of Colorado Boulder
2022 Wisconsin 275 Profile
Manufacturing
Chairman, president and CEO
Green Bay Packaging Inc. | Green Bay
William Kress represents the third generation of family leadership at Green Bay Packaging, serving as chairman, president and chief executive officer of the pulp and paper company.
During his tenure, the company has expanded through a series of acquisitions, including Franksville-based Midland Packaging and Display and Germantown-based Great Lakes Packaging Corp. in 2014; Waukesha-based Baird Display in 2015; and Fort Atkinson-based Wisconsin Packaging Corp., Traverse City, Michigan-based Grand Traverse Container Inc. and Aurora, Illinois-based Citadel Industries Inc. in 2018. That same year, the company broke ground on a $500 million new paper mill and expansion project in Green Bay, while its sales and distribution center in Downers Grove, Illinois, also commenced construction of a new 170,000-square-foot complex. With more than 3,700 employees, the company has operations across 37 locations in 16 states.
The company recently announced plans to build a new 600,000-square-foot “super plant” corrugator plant in Fort Worth, Texas. It has also expanded in recent years in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and Geneva, Ohio. Its products include shipping containers, folding cartons and coated label products. Its Green Bay mill recently achieved net-zero water in its production of 100% recycled containerboard, using a reclaimed water system.
Kress serves on the boards of the Green Bay Packers and advisory boards for Associated Bank and Junior Achievement. In 2016, he received the Rotary Club of Green Bay’s Free Enterprise Award.
