Technipaq expands with new Cary facility

CRYSTAL LAKE – Following years of growth, medical packaging products maker Technipaq is expanding with a new facility in Cary as it plans to boost production at its Crystal Lake manufacturing plant.

Technipaq, a family-owned company that makes flexible packaging for the health-care industry, bought a 45,000-square-foot building at 685 Industrial Drive in Cary. It will be used to store the raw materials now stacked up to the rafters at the Crystal Lake plant.

Freeing up space at the manufacturing plant will allow the company to add more machines and increase production, said Brian Rosenburg, vice president of marketing and sales at Technipaq Inc.

Sales at Technipaq have tripled since 2002. In the last three years alone, the company’s sales have increased 42 percent, Rosenburg said. It’s last expansion was seven years ago.

“To continue to grow the business, we really needed more space,” he said.

The company will invest more than $2 million in the expansion. That includes the cost of the warehouse building, equipment, and additional employees, Rosenburg said.

“We had been wanting to do this for two or three years, but with the economy, we were weary of making a big move,” he said. “When things stabilized and our growth continued, that gave us the confidence to go ahead.”

In addition to concerns about the economy, Technipaq executives worried about the impact of a 2.3 percent tax on medical devices that went into effect this year as part of the Affordable Care Act.

About 90 percent of the company’s products are for medical devices.

Technipaq also makes packaging for food products and other markets. Growth in the food segment has helped drive the company’s sales, Rosenburg said.

With additional space, Technipaq will be able to keep more raw materials on hand to more quickly serve customers, Roseburg said.

“We need to maintain large inventories of all our raw materials and products, to make sure that our customers’ orders are available for immediate delivery,” Rosenburg said. “The new building will help us continue to offer our clients fast turnaround and short lead times.”

It will also allow for additional manufacturing in the company’s 60,000 square-foot production facility, at 975 Lutter Drive in Crystal Lake, which also includes offices and some warehouse space.

Technipaq has about 140 employees. Rosenburg said the company has added about 20 new positions in the last year and is still looking to fill some jobs.