handed pagers. Different times. It’s been a wild ride! In the early days, we were a small group, so you’d see the whole company often. Obviously, it’s harder to get every- one together now. But overall, throughout all this growth, the company has held true to its roots. Putting employees first. Including them. Letting them know about everything that’s going on, and where we’re headed.” During this period, Bob and his leadership team were cracking the code of what building a great (little) company entails. Christine (Tindall) puts it succinctly: “There were two things that were always really important to my dad: culture and growth.” Bob suspected that these two goals were, in fact, two sides of the same coin. “If you treat people right, they treat each other right,” says Christine. “They treat vendors right. They treat customers right. That’s how growth happens.” So, when Bob got advice to cut management costs and simply push sales harder, he didn’t listen. Instead, he continued fostering genuine warmth in whatever way he could. And he also discovered the power of transparency and open communication. “The best thing I ever did was start running open books in the nineties,” he says. “I’d teach every employee how to read a financial statement. Every month, we’d review the books together. When you’re profit-sharing, it means people can see when they’ve made a few extra hundred Great Little Box Company (CONT’D FROM PAGE 24)
bucks in a month and that’s exciting. Everyone feels and acts like an owner.” Open communication was also key to the innovation that was gradually making GLBC a packaging company of note. At monthly meetings that included the entire compa- ny, creative ideas circulated freely.
GLBC headquarters in Richmond, BC, Canada.
Brad Tindall, Bob’s son-in-law and GLBC’s President since 2015, said: “If you put five people in a room and tell them to come up with innovative ideas, that’s a tall order. But if you have hundreds of people who are always en- couraged to think creatively and share their ideas, then as a manager you just have to become a good listener.” CONTINUED ON PAGE 28
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May 9, 2022
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