In this episode, Cory Connors welcomes back longtime friend of the show Ryan Fox from Bloomberg Intelligence for his fourth or fifth appearance. Ryan shares how he stumbled into the corrugated industry by accident in 2010 after a career detour through ministry and fitness equipment sales, and how he eventually landed at Bloomberg Intelligence in 2020 to cover the industry full time. The conversation dives deep into Ryan's one-of-a-kind Box Makers' Certificate (BMC) collection, the surprising history behind why BMCs exist at all, and what's really driving corrugated demand (or the lack of it) in 2025.
Key Topics Discussed:
- Ryan's winding path into corrugated: ministry, fitness equipment sales, an MBA in innovation management, and a chance connection into a box plant sales job
- How Ryan became a full-time industry analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence starting April 1, 2020
- Ryan's collection of over 500 Box Makers' Certificates (BMCs), how he organizes and classifies them, and his "This Old Box" LinkedIn series
- The 100+ year history of the BMC: corrugated's origins in the late 1890s, Robert Gare's accidental invention, and Sam Langston's early corrugating machine
- The 1914 Pridham decision, railroad price gouging, and how Rule 41 created the need for box certification
- The 1960s shift with NMFC Item 222 and how the 42-lb kraft linerboard / 26-lb semi-chemical medium index shaped "should-cost" pricing for 200-lb Mullen board
- The industry's move from Mullen to ECT (Edge Crush Test) starting in 1990, and why 32 ECT (C-flute) dominates as the commodity grade for single-wall boxes
- The science of box strength: the McKee formulation, predicting ECT from paper properties, and tools like the Chalmers Dynamic Stiffness Tester
- Behind-the-scenes craftsmanship: corrugator operations, die-mounting, flexographic print plates, and why a cutting die can cost $5,000
- The value of skilled trades on the plant floor and the case for box buyers to tour a corrugated plant
- 2025 industry trends: square footage of boxes produced matching 1994 levels, the impact of offshoring pre-packaged imports, and 400,000+ open U.S. manufacturing jobs
- Wages and opportunity in box plants, from $22/hour entry-level to $35/hour for skilled press operators
- Why corrugated demand spiked during the pandemic and has since receded: shifting consumer spending, GLP-1 drugs, e-commerce paper mailers, and macro headwinds like conflict in Iran and rising freight and gas prices
- Outlook for corrugated volume heading into the next 12-18 months
Resources Mentioned:
Contact:
Listeners interested in Bloomberg Intelligence's corrugated and box industry research can reach out to Ryan Fox.
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