Spinnaker Coating LLC
Founded: Predecessor company, Brown-Bridge Industries, was started in Troy in 1928.
Headquarters: Offices at 518 Water St., Troy, with a plant at 130 Marybill Drive.
Employees: 215 in Troy, about 230 nationwide.
Products: Pressure-sensitive and adhesive label papers.
2009 revenue: About $75 million. On track so far this year to beat that, with order volumes up so far by about 25 percent.
Source: Spinnaker
TROY — When Louis Guzzetti Jr. joined what was then Spinnaker Industries in April 2001, a company plant in Westbrook, Maine was losing $3 million a year, labor-management relations were bitter, and the company was in disarray.
Today, Spinnaker Coating LLC has reduced debt, shed costly assets, added local shifts and workers and has seen order volume jump 25 percent in the first quarter of 2010 compared with the same quarter a year ago.
Guzzetti, chairman and chief executive of the label material maker, offers a trio of reasons for the turnaround: Salaried and hourly employee pay cuts, a new $1.6 million investment, and getting banks to agree to modify debt.
He offers another reason: “The key competitive weapon was (customer) service.”
Guzzetti has been led the company for nine years. He works in Troy Monday through Thursday each week and spends weekends at a family home in New Canaan, Conn. He never thought he would be with Spinnaker for nearly a decade, he said.
“I’m still having fun — a lot of it, as a matter of fact,” he said.
Pressure-sensitive labels can be found on many items and represent a $2.5 billion industry in the United States. About 25 percent of Spinnaker’s customers are small commercial printers. The other 75 percent are larger converters, which cut and shape much larger orders of labels. Their customers include retail giants and household products.
“We don’t make labels,” said James Severs, the company’s vice president, human resources/administration. “We make the raw materials from which people make labels.”
The pay cuts for both salaried and hourly employees have been restored by about a third, Guzzetti said. Its Marybill Drive plant, which had been operating 24 hours a day four days a week, will now operate 24 hours five or six days a week. And the company plans to hire three to five additional employees.
Postle believes customers are beefing up inventories they had allowed to shrink last year.
About the Author
