The New Scale in Flexible Packaging: Winning by Mastering Complexity

Wes Bradford of Propelis says the future of converting belongs to the complexity-ready.

Published on Mar. 9, 2026

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In the flexible packaging industry, the defining condition is no longer just growth, but structural complexity. Brand portfolios are expanding with more SKUs, channel-specific versions, regulatory variations, and material formats. Converters who focus solely on throughput efficiency are falling behind those who are redesigning their operating models around "complexity economics." The converters pulling ahead are building operational flexibility at scale, integrating systems, aligning organizations, and developing disciplined commercial models to turn complexity into a competitive advantage.

Why it matters

As SKU proliferation continues, inefficiencies that originate upstream in quoting, specification alignment, artwork handling, and disconnected systems will multiply. Converters need to compress decision cycles across the enterprise, not just reduce changeover time on the floor. Integrated technology, organizational design, and a focus on total system performance are now essential to thriving in a high-variation market.

The details

Traditional functional silos were built for predictability, but in a world of constant variation, alignment becomes strategic. Sales, supply chain, and production planning must be closely integrated to reduce cognitive drag and enable decisions to move at the same pace as demand. Converters must also quantify and communicate the value they create in managing complexity, reducing obsolescence risk, and lowering finished goods inventory exposure to deliver faster promotional agility.

  • The research cited in the article found that a majority of brand owners reported double-digit SKU increases over the past few years, with expectations that this proliferation will continue.

The players

Wes Bradford

An executive at Propelis, formerly known as SGK, who discusses the future of flexible packaging converting.

Propelis

A company that provides brand impact solutions, including flexible packaging converting services, and is the parent company of the formerly known SGK.

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What they’re saying

“Scale today is not producing more of the same. It is building operational flexibility at scale. It is the ability to shift between long-run flexo and short-run digital without destabilizing schedules. The ability to integrate new material structures without reworking the entire workflow. The ability to absorb late-stage design changes without triggering cascading delays. That kind of scale is orchestration, not expansion.”

— Wes Bradford (packagingstrategies.com)

The takeaway

The future of flexible packaging converting belongs to the converters who can re-architect their businesses to thrive in complexity. They will be the ones who build integrated systems, aligned organizations, and disciplined commercial models that turn complexity into a competitive advantage, rather than simply focusing on throughput efficiency.