EPL's Anand Kripalu: The importance and effectiveness of packaging

The Cadbury story
How many of you, especially those from India, remember the infestation crisis of Cadbury chocolates in 2003-2004. Kripalu mentioned, "The media was attacking the brand and the company that there were creepy crawlies in the chocolate. This is a product that you put into your kids mouth!

The impact – the brand was collapsing.

The decision by the Cadbury management team during that time was to shift to hermetically sealed laminate packaging, signalling that it was ‘purity sealed’. And that move saved the day.

The Cadbury brand grew by a CAGR of 30% for eight years thereafter.

The message was clear: Packaging has a big role to play. To keep the product safe till the consumer consumes it.

That's how the brand could do work that the company can be truly proud of!

The EPL journey
After more than three decades in FMCG, I moved to EPL, a leading global speciality packaging company.

The EPL journey began in 1984 with a bold vision: to introduce laminated tubes in India to a market dominated by aluminium packaging. What started as a small unit in India became a powerhouse.

In 1993, EPL took our first major step overseas by establishing our first plant outside India in Egypt. That move was pivotal. It marked the beginning of our transformation from a local Indian company into a global leader.

Today the group reaches all major markets across the globe with over 75% of EPL’s revenues coming from outside India. We have manufacturing facilities across North and South America, Europe and Asia. We are one of the few Indian companies to have multiple plants in Mainland China.

EPL employs over 5,300 people from 25 nationalities, and serves 80 countries across five continents. The group manufactures eight billion tubes in a year. That's one tube per person on this planet.

We understand the growing need for sustainability. We have led the charge in creating sustainable packaging solutions with one-third of our tubes being fully recyclable.

EPL is an Ecovadis Gold Certified as a global company.

Recently, we set up a greenfield project in Brazil with production commencing in under 15 months – from concept to commercial supply, supported by the most cutting edge tube making technology.

Today, EPL is a rare example of a non IT multinational from India.

Taking India to the world: Principles that have helped us globalise…
Standardisation of processes across all our global plants. We follow a stringent system of quality checks, automated defect detection, and a seamless supply chain. This ensures that no matter where our tubes are manufactured - they meet the same high standards. This consistency has earned us the trust of global brands.

EPL is a vertically integrated company, from polymer to laminate to tube to caps. An end-to-end maker of tubes. 

We make our laminates in India and China where costs are lower. Laminates are freight friendly. We ship these laminates around the world and make the tubes as close as possible to the customer.

We are a listed company in India with one of the best operating margins in the packaging industry. This has been achieved by bringing Indian middle class values of frugality and cost leadership to all our operations.

We maintain a workplace culture that values family and fosters long-term commitment. Our average employee tenure is over 10 years.

We train our people here in India and send them all over the world. Indians generally love going overseas.

Our customer first approach has helped forge partnerships with some of the biggest and most iconic brands in the world. Companies like Unilever, Colgate, GSK, P&G, L’Oréal rely on EPL’s packaging solutions to deliver not just products, but experiences. We’ve been with these brands through their global expansions, helping them to meet the evolving demands of consumers in every corner of the world

EPL and a bit of trivia: The road in Poland where our plant is located is called MG Road – in honour of Mahatma Gandhi!

Looking ahead
We’re driving forward with a commitment to sustainability that’s not only a goal but a guiding principle. A philosophy. An emotional commitment. Our vision is clear: To be the most sustainable packaging company in the world.

Plastics is a bad word. Like alcohol. Alcohol companies have prospered by advocating ‘Responsible consumption’. We need to be responsible manufacturers of plastic packaging and do it proudly – not apologetically.

Therefore EPL has led the charge in creating sustainable, eco-friendly packaging solutions that meet the growing demand of responsible businesses.

We are determined to support customers achieve their conversion targets and push forward the agenda of sustainability.

At EPL, we follow the three R’s – Reduce, Reuse, Recycle mantra across processes.

We are targeting Ecovadis Platinum by 2025.Finally we are working toward net-zero emissions by 2050.