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#249 Driving Digital: How BHS Corrugated is Transforming the Future of Packaging

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In this episode of the FuturePrint Podcast, we welcome Nils Gottfried, Senior Sales Manager and marketing responsible for the BHS Jetliner Series at  BHS Corrugated. In this discussion, we explore the digital transformation underway in the world of corrugated packaging.

Nils shares his personal journey from analogue offset printing to pioneering digital solutions within BHS’s Jetliner programme. We discuss the evolving demands from brands for more sustainable, agile, and customisable packaging—and how these are pushing converters to embrace change.

With over 300 years of heritage, BHS Corrugated is hardly a newcomer. But as Nils reveals, the company is anything but stuck in the past. In fact, it is leading the charge in redefining how corrugated packaging is produced—leveraging digital print, automation, and intelligent systems to reshape the value chain from the ground up.

Topics include:

  • Why digital print is finally gaining momentum in corrugated
  • The efficiency and sustainability benefits of on-demand production
  • How BHS Corrugated is integrating AI, automation and lifecycle analytics via its new Corruverse strategy
  • The global dynamics shaping adoption, from North America’s bold moves to Asia’s rapid prototyping culture

This is a must-listen for anyone interested in the future of packaging, manufacturing innovation, or the strategic role of digital print in modern supply chains.

Listen now and discover how legacy, innovation and intelligent systems are converging to create the next chapter in industrial packaging.

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Marcus Timson:

switch that off, okay, yeah.

Niils Gottfried:

I think, we're good to go okay, welcome to the future print podcast. For the latest episode I'm delighted to have with me actually back with me, because we've done one before, but this one is a much more updated and, I think, more comprehensive discussion with Nils Gottfried, who is Senior Sales Manager at BHS, corrugated specifically for the Jetliner series. So welcome back to the podcast, nils.

Marcus Timson:

Thank you, marcus, and thank you again for the opportunity to have that podcast with you. I'm really looking forward to it.

Niils Gottfried:

Fantastic, yeah, great to have you back. I know you've got a lot of news to share and interesting insights and so on. We've had you speak in Valencia and I know there's some interesting things that you're going to be sharing with everyone. So welcome, nils, it's great to have you with us. To start with, could you just give us a quick overview of perhaps your role at BHS Corrugated and perhaps what your kind of day-to-day focus might look a little like?

Marcus Timson:

Yes, of course. So I'm now nearly four years at BHS Corrugated. Course, so I'm now nearly four years at BHS Corrugated. I work there as a senior sales manager for the Jetliner series, a series of single-pass print systems for the corrugated market. My role is mainly I have two roles I'm senior sales manager, but as well I'm the product marketing manager for the Jetliner series and I'm helping, of course, all our sales teams globally to sell the Jetliner series. And as well I'm an interface to R&D, so I help here translating information from R&D product information.

Niils Gottfried:

Translate that to information for our global sales teams that to information for our global sales teams, brilliant and BHS. Corrugated is obviously a well-known, very famous brand within the corrugated industry as well, which we'll find more out about as we continue to talk. Perhaps for those who are listening that are not so familiar with corrugated or the corrugated sector, why is it such an important and fast-evolving part of print and packaging today?

Marcus Timson:

So if we look at the packaging market, it's still in a huge. The areas are still very analog. It's a very analog segment if you look at that. But what we see at the moment is that customers really want to understand what digital means and especially what digital print means. If we look at the volume that is printed digitally at the moment, we see that the volume is still very small. But we believe, with the changing mindset that we see at our customers, that this will grow over the next years significantly. What we see here as well and I think we will touch base on that later as well and we see a trend in North America where they took that up very, very fast already and we believe really that the rest of the world will follow. So what we see here is really the trend of uh will follow. So what we see here is really the trend of um understand digital print and um, the willingness to adopt it.

Niils Gottfried:

Right, right and um, yeah, it's interesting, different, different markets do different things at different stages and different locations. Of course, um, yourself, nils, you're obviously within a vhs corrugated and a corrugated industry, but your background and I think you've got a, you're really your legacy and background is digital, isn't it? Tell us a bit about your own journey. How do you get into the print packaging space and how did you end up being a BHS corrugated?

Marcus Timson:

That's interesting. So I started my career as an officer printer. So that was years ago in the 90s. But then very soon I noticed OK, that is not the end of my life. So I decided to study printing technologies at the University of Wuppertal and there I was already involved into digital print, involved into digital print. And then, after studying digital printing technologies, I joined a company called Kappa at the time. It became very soon then Smurfit Kappa.

Marcus Timson:

So I started my career as a professional in the corrugated industry. After a while I changed my job to a company called GMG Color, a leading color management company, and there I was responsible as well for partnership management and especially partnerships for all the OEMs that are developing inkjet systems, like Mimaki, like Epson, like HP. So there I got the first experience of really digital print, at that time for proofing. And after a while I changed my job to Fujifilm where I really really started to deep dive into digital print, the sector of white-format inkjet. And then I got a call from VHS and they introduced me to that project, the Jetliner series, and that was of course very, very interesting and I decided to sign with BHS and be part of that very amazing and very interesting project developing single pass print systems for the corrugated industry.

Niils Gottfried:

Right, right. And so, yeah, your journey has been nicely rounded a mixture of corrugated, but also very much involved in developing inkjet and digital solutions, which is clearly why you're pivotal to this jetliner development With your journey and maybe more latterly as well with BHS. What have been some of your kind of key learnings or experiences perhaps that shape your views on innovation and technology in this sector?

Marcus Timson:

This is interesting because when I started in the corrugated industry, my first project was an analog project, more or less, so we started looking about the possibilities to integrate a print system into the corrugator. Now that was a flexo-analog print system to produce fan fold and fan fold with print on it. That was my first project, really, but what I saw already there is that there is a lot of innovation drive in that segment and what we see, or what some others might see, is that they believe this is a conservative segment in the corrugated industry from the outside. But if you are in that space and if you talk to the people and to our customers, you see that these customers that we have are very innovative and they need innovative partners, like VHS, for example, that help them to understand market changes and, of course, help them to adopt these market changes and implement and buy innovative products right and um, with that in mind, I guess bhs corrugated, like I've known for for many years as being a kind of very established leader, uh, in the segment.

Niils Gottfried:

So you've got a long. Bhs has a long and respected heritage. Can you give us a perhaps a little overview of the company's journey to now and its role shaping modern corrugated? Yeah?

Marcus Timson:

of course. So if you look at the company, it was founded more than 300 years ago, so it exists for a very, very long time. Um, it has a very long history. In the corrugated industry Worldwide, we have, at the moment, more than 3,500 employees. If you look at all the global footprint we have, we have nine production sites worldwide where we are producing machines, complete corrugators, corrugating rolls, and, of course, we have more than 20 regional service locations around the globe. And this makes us, of course, to a very important and very trusted partner to all businesses in the corrugated industry.

Niils Gottfried:

Yeah, that kind of depth and spread provides and legacy provides a huge advantage, I think, for the customers and also for you developing new things, so switching in from corrugators to digital solutions. Obviously BHS covers a wide spectrum. Now what would you say really defines the company's DNA and approach to solving customer challenges?

Marcus Timson:

That's an interesting question as well. When I started working at BHS, I was really amazed about the drive for innovation, and I think this is really DNA of the company driving innovation, always developing the latest products that the customers really need and, of course, fast adoption of industry trends. We're never standing still. We always see oh, there is something new. Let's develop a product for the needs of our customers. What is, of course, as well, very important for us and is a DNA, is the relationship to our customers, that we see this more as a partnership. We are seen in the industry as a very trustworthy company and, of course, we have long-term goals and, of course, we are supporting as well our customers' long-term goals to be successful. This is really what we do. We are there to-term goals to be successful. This is really what we do. We are there to help our customers to be successful yeah, yeah, critical really, isn't it?

Niils Gottfried:

particularly now more than ever, when the world is um more and more unpredictable? I guess, um with that in mind, the market trends, market trends really um help shape business in a huge way, doesn't it? Don't they Give us, perhaps describe, the major market trends currently shaping corrugated packaging globally? Could you give us a little bit of an insight there in terms of what those trends are or what you feel they are?

Marcus Timson:

Definitely, but I think it's too layered. We see here, uh, really global trends that are not really related to an application or to the end product. What is happening at the moment is, of course, there's a lot of merger and acquisition in the market. That means we have a lot of movements. Companies are merged, they are, they acquire other. That means there is a lot of movement, really, that in these companies.

Marcus Timson:

What is the goal for all these companies, of course, is that they want to produce more efficient than ever before. Efficiency becomes really a very important topic at the moment, and with that, of course, they tend to have a more holistic view, from papermaking to print, to converting to delivery, so they're looking at the complete value chain in their segment, and that was not the case always before. What is important here is, as well, that they look into digitalization and automation of processes, and this has this has a reason as well. Um, what we see, of course, is still um and this is an ongoing issue and that will will be an issue for for a long time as well is the lack of workforce and skilled, skilled employees. So what they are looking for is automation of processes and, of course, reduce the workforce and somehow close the gap that they don't have skilled employees or operators anymore.

Niils Gottfried:

And if you look, then into digital print, of course this is when we can help with digital print and support them in achieving their goals it adds like a, an agility to the production, doesn't it that exactly, process and efficiency and, as you said rightly, skill shortages are a big issue. Um, customers feel all of these trends as well and obviously that you're adapting to meet those demands. What, what, what from a customer point of view? What do you think are the biggest shifts you've seen perhaps in customer expectations and supply chain over the past few years?

Marcus Timson:

this is related as well to that. We need to look into the complete value chain. What is there is very important for them is, of course, is lead times. In the past, they have been used to wait for products when they order, maybe of three to four weeks. Now, if we think about high quality flexo preprint, from the order of the job to the final delivery, there was a time frame of three to four weeks, and that was generally accepted. But with these changing times and the more serialization and more versioning, they don't accept that anymore. They want to have their products shorter, they want to have it faster and that, of course, is really an important factor at the moment.

Marcus Timson:

And if you don't adopt, then digitally or digital production technologies like digital print, they can't cope with that traditional production process anymore. Additionally, of course, if you look into the complete supply chain, um, they don't want to produce on stock anymore. Nobody wants that, because producing on stock means that at the end of the year, you will throw away product packaging that is not used anymore. Now, what they want and what brands want at the moment is a full on-demand order and production process. Brands want at the moment is a full on-demand order and production process, they want to avoid overproduction and, of course, they want to avoid paper waste. And this is really is a big, let's say, shift in the market. And you can only support that and only reach that shift by adopting digital technologies, not only digital print, but digital production technologies and track and trace systems over the complete value chain.

Niils Gottfried:

Yeah, yeah, and efficiency is obviously a key driver, a key thing within the industry and possibly many industries, but I think, in particular, corrugated. It leads me really onto sustainability. So, obviously, speed to market is a big deal. Sustainability, though, how are these factors as well as speed to market, the environment influencing decisions around packaging production in your opinion? You know, sustainability is a theme that is talked about, has been talked about for, I don't know, 10, 15, 20 years. How are these factors influencing decisions?

Marcus Timson:

A lot in the corrugated industry.

Marcus Timson:

Of course, there is a big, let's say, counter-opinion.

Marcus Timson:

Here is plastic, and if you follow this discussion between the plastic industry and the paper-based packaging industry, you can clearly see that the converters and that the producers of paper packaging, that they care about, that they really do a lot at the moment about that, to make their processes more sustainable, and that we need to push all together paper-based packaging.

Marcus Timson:

That's very important. And, of course, everybody at the moment, every company we talk to, if you look at their websites and if you look at their marketing materials, they are talking about these factors and they're talking about sustainability. And of course, what you can do is, if you talk about sustainability, you can include here as well, speak, the speed to market. Now, this is nothing which excludes each other. This goes alongside and goes in parallel now sustainability and speed to market. But of course, the focus is here and if you look at all the information they publicize all the big converters, the, the big production sites they talk about paper-based packaging, reducing as well the use of paper and this is not only waste, this as well reducing paper-based, the grammage in the paper-based packaging, to reduce the overall paper consumption.

Niils Gottfried:

Yeah, so it's a big deal, and I guess then, from inherent in the dna of the business. But equally, I guess the future, this, this, is going to rise and continue to be a concern, isn't it? Sustainability is not going to suddenly become a side issue. It's becoming more front and center for everybody. I think absolutely so. Moving on to technology a little, digital printing itself is always the word game. Change is always used, isn't it as a, I guess, a key theme and advantage for adopting it? One as well? Isn't it what makes it so compelling in this sector, perhaps compared to traditional flexo or litho, it you kind of touched on already. What is? Is it going to replace the analog systems? What? What does it do? That really is exciting and should be really understood by the corrugated industry yeah.

Marcus Timson:

So if we, if we look at digital, of course it it brings along a lot of benefits. Now, if you look at all the involved processes that you have to produce, for example, analog pre-print, you have to make ready process, you have to waste, you have all the resources, you need to look at that and this is all things you need to take into account and you need to see what you can offset with digital technologies from that. Now big benefits. Of course, here digital print is seasonal and versioning, on-demand production. We touched base a little bit on that already. But if you really look into the numbers, you see that digital production brings you benefits in the production process.

Marcus Timson:

If we look at and you mentioned that the Lysol lamination process, of course that's a very cost-intensive process. You have very expensive equipment, you have people that need to run these machines, you have very expensive glue to laminate, a lot of production steps and you have very long lead times. And, of course, if you combine all these numbers, you see there are clearly benefits if you produce digitally. If you look at the production step, if you replace litholamination with a digital printing process and a corrugator, we have just two production processes. We are printing directly on the paper. We provide that pre-printed paper to the corrugator and we produce a pre-printed corrugated sheets. This is two production steps. This, to my opinion, is very efficient and very attractive economically for the customers. So if you combine these two processes, you can see clearly the benefits of producing digitally.

Niils Gottfried:

And is it a complementary technology? Digital Do you see a time where perhaps digital will become the mainstream, or do you think it is really a complementary technology?

Marcus Timson:

So I would really look into the past if we try to compare here, because from my experience, what we did in the other company, we tried to sell digital printing machines, digital printers, to screen printers and if you look into the screen market at the moment that all the screen printers they kept their old analog technology, but everybody of them has a digital device. So they adopted digital print and I'm sure that we will see this in the corrugated industry as well. You know, everybody at the moment is very interested in digital print in the corrugated industry. Um, they are start buying on digital print technology. Some bought some smaller entry-level products. Um, some others bought bigger products, but they want to understand it.

Marcus Timson:

You know, and and I think this is a very good story, and this is a very good story that can as well explain the future of the corrugated segment that people adopt digital print, but they will still keep some of the analog systems for specialty products, for example. For example, if you look at that, I don't believe in a full or in a hybrid production way. For example, what we are doing here at the moment to take out hybrid production steps in digital print, we are developing digital varnish and that means that we don't need any more hybrid production where we are developing digital varnish and that means that we don't need any more hybrid production where we are printing digitally and adding an analog flexo varnish system to the digital device. That doesn't make sense now.

Niils Gottfried:

in the end, if we produce digitally, it should be a full digital process yeah, interesting, um, shifting from technology to applications, because corrugated, you know is, is a, you pick, you picture what corrugated means in your mind, that there are different applications and business models. What? What for digital corrugated? What are the best or what are the applications best suited to digital and where are you perhaps seeing the strongest uptake or the strongest growth for digital and corr? You perhaps seeing the strongest uptake or the strongest growth for digital and corrugated in terms of applications?

Marcus Timson:

I think here again we need to distinguish between sheet to sheet production and roll to roll. Both have its markets For us clearly. Clearly roll-to-roll single pass is the solution we should focus on. And of course, here within our portfolio we need to distinguish between the Jetliner Monochrome and the Jetliner XSEED. The Jetliner Monochrome is a printer that is fully integrated into the corrugator, and the Jetliner XSEED is a printer that can be used standalone as a roll-to-roll system, or we can as well support the printed liner directly to the corrugator, but both are different systems in the end.

Niils Gottfried:

but here we really need to distinguish between that but here we really need to distinguish between that yeah, yeah, it makes sense and um, and I guess as well. You see, like I said earlier, really I guess you might see different patterns in different parts of the world. Just thinking about europe first, and north america, possibly the, the, the biggest um immediate markets, geographically at least. Um. Explain a bit about how Europe differs to North America when it comes to investing in corrugated. How does that work? In terms of applications as well, are there differences?

Marcus Timson:

So for me, working in both markets, working globally, I have a very good insight and we have very good and very dynamic discussions in both markets.

Marcus Timson:

There is no difference.

Marcus Timson:

But what we see here is that the North American market adopted digital print very quickly and they already transferred flexor graphic work to digital, and this is not happening in that volume at the moment in Europe.

Marcus Timson:

Of course, here we we have some very good companies that adopted digitally as well, but it's not as big as in the United States. What we see as well is and we're talking here with brands in Europe and we're talking with brands as well in the Americas that the acceptance by the brands is much higher in North America, that the acceptance by the brands is much higher in North America. These brands already see the value of improving the lead times and reducing the cost by adopting digital technology. What we will see, of course, in the future is that the more and more we bring into the market digital print, that the acceptance of quality will change as well in these markets. And I'm pretty sure that in the future it's more important to focus here on the lead times and on reducing costs instead of always providing they always call that flex or offset-like quality, and I think this will not be the focus in the future anymore.

Niils Gottfried:

No speed and agility and efficiency will outpace that, I'm sure because of the speed of change in the consumer world as much as anything else. Obviously, you've got a global role and I love Asia as a place. I think it's fascinating. It's a wonderful place, obviously probably quite different to North America and Europe. So give us a feel for what's happening in Asia in terms of innovation. How's the market evolving there? What lessons perhaps can other regions learn from Asia?

Marcus Timson:

Yeah, china for us, or Asia as such, is a very interesting market for PHS. We have their all regional offices, we have a production site in Shanghai, including an R&D department, and, of course, they are focusing not only on corrugators, they are focusing as well on digital print. I visited them last December and that was really interesting to get in touch with the team to see what they are developing. And what you see is there is more is more like more doing, less talking. They're really starting and kicking off projects very quickly. They have very quickly a first let's say a first prototype you can call that rapid prototyping and what they do is then adopting on the fly, and I think this is very different to R&D work in the rest of the world, and I think this is where they have the benefits, where they are much faster and where they can adopt quicker to changes and to market requests.

Niils Gottfried:

Yeah, and that's something I think we can learn from that speed and willingness to try things out and to move quickly and to, to some extent, break the rules in a way, I mean, or break the culture of bit by bit by bit, just jumping over that and doing something very quickly and very innovatively.

Marcus Timson:

Exactly exactly, and I think this is really why it is so important for us and for our R&D teams and for the R&D teams in Shanghai and Asia to cooperate, to work together and to really try to develop products together, because in the end, it is a global market, we are a global society. It's not anymore like I'm focusing only on Europe, I'm only focusing on Germany. This is really like, with all the the communication possibilities we have at the moment and how quick and how fast information is transferred around the globe, you cannot think in these silos anymore.

Niils Gottfried:

That's not possible no, no, absolutely quite right. Um, so, thinking now about bhs corrug, obviously clearly recognized for your innovation and leadership in the marketplace, if you were sort of talking to customers and thinking about customers, what do you think? What should customers be thinking about in terms of future investment strategy? How does your and how does your technology, or the Jetliner technology portfolio support perhaps that long-term view in terms of competitiveness, exactly?

Marcus Timson:

And, if you remember, we launched last year a campaign called the Box Plan 2025. Recently, we launched a new campaign it's called the Corover Strategy launched. A new campaign is called the Corover strategy, and this really delivers a very, very holistic, intelligent and adaptive solution for our customers to streamline the complete production process. Now we have in this Coroverse all the products we developed so far. We will include into the Corover strategy all the upcoming products in our global portfolio, not only digital print, but, of course, digital print is a very important part of that. There will be AI-driven automation systems, digital lifecycle services for maximum efficiency, of course, for transparency and for the most possible flexibility for our customers. What we have in mind for the future and when we talk with customers, it's not talking about next year. We always talk about what happens in two years, in three years, in five years, because the investments that our customers make is long-term investments.

Niils Gottfried:

It's not short-term, it's always long-term and we are here to develop products for them and, of course, support them in adopting the chains, the changes, and help them to become more efficient, of course, and, with that, more successful yeah, and that long term view or, like you say, medium term view is really important because the investments you make now have to be right for the future and allow that flexibility and that, like you said, collaboration, that partnership, it's really important, isn't it? Um? If you're looking ahead, so in terms of your yourself and also bhs in the next sort of I don't know five years, perhaps, what? What's exciting you at the moment about the next five years in corrugated and where you think BHS corrugated is going, give us a vision for the future, your thinking.

Marcus Timson:

Thank, you for the question, marcus. I think this is a very interesting question as well, and it's a little bit. We have a very clear target and a vision to become number one partner for our customers in the segment of corrugated. For me personally, of course, I'm looking into digital print, and our aim is to become a very well-recognized OEM for digital print solutions for the corrugated market With that new global portfolio that we clearly have lined out already in our plans internally in the company. We see that we will have a very interesting global portfolio of single-pass printers for various markets and with these products, of course, we want to serve our customers with the latest innovations, and here again, it's efficiency and the economic benefits that we need to talk about now.

Niils Gottfried:

so we are working here really on a on a plan for the next five years um to become an oem in the digital world makes sense and it looks like, and hat sounds like you're very much on your way to that with the journey and the commitment you're putting behind developing the right technology to deliver the right kind of value over a long period of time, which I think is is links very much with sustainability, of course. And well, listen, thanks.

Marcus Timson:

So much for joining.

Niils Gottfried:

It's really nice to hear the story and get a view of the industry from your perspective and also BHS's commitment, a new theme which I'm looking forward to discovering more about. Thank you for joining us today at the FutureBit podcast.

Marcus Timson:

Thank you, Marcus. As always, it was a very nice discussion and I'm very happy that we do this.

Niils Gottfried:

Great stuff. Look forward to the next one. Thanks Nils, thank you Markus.

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Frazer Chesterman

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Marcus Timson

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