If you live in the Treasure Valley, you’ve likely seen samples of their eye-catching food packaging on the shelves of your neighborhood grocery store. Falls Brand, Mother Earth Brewing, Darigold, Guru Donuts, Sockeye Brewing and Idahoan are just a sampling of the local brands that packaging manufacturer Dixon Container Company counts as loyal customers. Growing interest in locally produced, food-safe packaging created an opportunity for Dixon Container to enter the food packaging market in 2013 with their new food-certified folding carton plant in Boise.
Completely renovated for food-grade manufacturing, the new folding carton plant installed equipment to sheet cut paper rolls; then print, die-cut, fold, glue, and even add cellophane windows to a custom-designed folded carton package. An expert in-house design team ensures each package can withstand the rigors of fulfillment and be produced affordably with minimal waste. The plant continues to innovate, evolve and upgrade; adding presses, die cutters, gluers, and a litho-laminator to manage increased demand. Despite all the changes, annual food certification audits guarantee packaging produced there is always food safe.
Dixon Container Company was founded in 1984 to meet the need for custom corrugated cardboard boxes and displays for local manufacturers and shippers. Over the past 30 years, they have grown from a mom-and-pop garage-based shop to a thriving manufacturing company with over 90 employees and 125,000 sq. ft. of manufacturing space across three Boise-based locations. Their manufactured product portfolio has expanded beyond corrugated cardboard to include corrugated plastic, folding cartons, litho-laminated corrugate, foam fabrication, and custom crates and pallets.
Jay Washburn acquired Dixon Container from founders Doug and Michelle Dixon in 2007 after retiring from a career as a paper industry executive. He has led the company through much growth, not only building their folding carton plant from the ground up but continuing to upgrade their corrugated sheet manufacturing plant with new machinery and evolve their product offering to affordably meet customer demand. Thanks to his expert guidance, Dixon Container now buys paper rolls directly from the mills and can cut their own sheets from rolls as well as using “press-ready” sheets precut at the paper mill.
Throughout its growth, Dixon Container has continued its commitment to the innovative packaging design, quality manufacturing, and exceptional customer service they have always been known for. Quality assurance measures taken throughout the production process ensure Dixon Container’s customers are satisfied with the final product. Exceptional customer service ensures customers remain loyal, even when the unexpected happens.
Dixon Container’s account managers aren’t just responsible for product sales. With decades of experience in product packaging, they wear many hats – project manager, customer relationship manager, packaging engineer to name just a few of the roles they assume with Dixon Container customers. “We don’t worry about minimums,” said account manager Jefferson Washburn, “we’re interested in guiding customers to where they want their packaging to be.” With bootstrapping entrepreneurs, that sometimes means relying on Dixon Container’s role as a distributor of packaging supplies like stock boxes or bags, bubble wrap and tape to get them there.
Listening to what customers need resulted in Dixon Container Company adding some unique products to their lineup. From a customer’s need to wash out their concrete mixers responsibly stemmed the design of a lined corrugated container they now manufacture to capture concrete waste. Their experience in designing custom crates led them to add core sample boxes for the mining industry to their list of manufactured products and they now carry an inventory of many sizes and styles.
Dixon Container Company relies on good old-fashioned face-to-face time to communicate with their customers. “We go, we stop in.” replied Jefferson Washburn when asked how they prefer to communicate with their customers. Their one-to-one customer relationship strategy is what makes their IMA membership so valuable. Dixon’s customers are manufacturers, so they get the opportunity to rub shoulders with many of them at IMA events. Haven’t had a chance to meet Jay and Jefferson Washburn in person? Go to dixoncontainer.com to contact them and learn more.