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Kyle Stephens[/caption]
Milwaukee-based
Craft Beverage Warehouse, a beverage-packaging materials distributor, has made a "multi-million-dollar" investment in a new print-to-aluminum can line that will double the company’s printing capacity – and could also double its employee count.
CBW, located within
Century City Business Park, was founded at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. The company did not receive its first printing machine until late 2022 due to increased lead times, which were spurred on by supply chain disruptions. This means CBW missed its first busy season for printing, which would have been spring of 2022. When CBW finally received its first machine, the company saw immediate growth.
“Spring is the time when clients produce a lot of their product to sell during the summer,” said
Kyle Stephens, co-founder and president of CBW. “Since this time last year, we’ve just seen meteoric growth and our lead times have increased for manufacturing production.”
To keep CBW’s lead times manageable, company leadership decided it was necessary to add the second print-to-aluminum can line.
Before the addition of the second printing line, CBW printed about 15 million cans a year. That number is expected to double to 30 million. The company declined to disclose the dollar amount of its investment in the second printing line.
The company will add between six and 10 full-time employees over the next year to help operate the new printing line, which could nearly double its current workforce of 11 people. Doubling both its printing capacity and employee base means CBW will temporarily be tight on physical space.
“It’s going to put a little bit of a crunch on us,” said Stephens. “Fortunately, with us printing more cans, our inventory will flow through the warehouse more quickly. We should have a smaller footprint for raw materials.”
Still, the company is searching for some sort of warehouse space nearby to ease space constraints. If CBW continues to grow at its current rate, Stephens CBW could soon consider expanding nationally.
"We would probably look at getting closer to some of our other customers in different regions of the country," said Stephens. "Where that is kind of remains to be seen, but that's something we do have our eye toward."
CBW was able to finance its multi-million-dollar investment with the assistance of Educators Credit Union and the Milwaukee Economic Development Corp.
