The $8.4-billion acquisition of Evansville-based Berry Global Group by Swiss company Amcor announced Nov. 19 means the city will lose a corporate headquarters, but its buyer says the company still will have a local workforce.
Founded in Evansville in 1967, Berry first was known as Imperial Plastics. It made aerosol overcaps using one injection molding machine.
Over the next 57 years, the company – which became known as Berry Plastics Corp. in 1982 after its purchase by Jack Berry Sr. – blossomed into a worldwide operation with more than 240 sites and 40,000-plus workers.
Despite Berry Global’s immense reach — officials changed the word “Plastics” in its corporate name to “Global” in 2017 to emphasize its expansion far outside the River City — the company maintains a workforce of more than 2,400 in its home region.
Berry’s growing portfolio obviously caught Amcor’s eye. Both companies make packaging products used in multiple industries – food and beverage, pharmaceutical and medical, and home and personal care.
The acquisition means Berry’s headquarters will relocate from Oakley Street in Evansville to Zurich, Switzerland, when the transaction closes in mid-2025. The Nov. 19 news release states the combined company “expects to maintain a significant presence in Evansville.”
Kevin Kwilinski, who began his tenure as CEO of Berry Global in October 2023, describes the merger with Amcor as “a logical next step in our company’s evolution” and says it will “deliver even more value to our shareholders.”
“We expect to better serve customers through a comprehensive and innovative consumer packaging portfolio and a complementary geographic coverage,” Kwilinksi says in the release. “Importantly Berry and Amcor have aligned philosophies focused on safety, employee experience, sustainability, innovation, customer intimacy, and functional excellence. We will be better together, and I look forward to all we will achieve as a combined organization.”
A report on the merger published by Reuters states that “a sharp slowdown in demand for packaging material following a boom fueled by e-commerce during the pandemic has sparked consolidation in the sector.”
News of corporate mergers often bring uncertainties, but Evansville Regional Economic Partnership CEO Lloyd Winnecke says there’s no reason to believe Amcor will not keep Berry Global’s longstanding Southwestern Indiana ties.
Winnecke noted the news release announcing the merger mentions only two cities – Zurich and Evansville.
“While we won’t be able to brag about the headquarters being here, I think at the end of the day, the most important thing is they will maintain their significant employment, design and manufacturing presence in Evansville,” Winnecke says.
Winnecke, Evansville’s mayor from 2012 to 2023, says his administration and others completed projects over the years that assisted Berry Global, such as improvements along Mary and Division streets, which improved rail access to Berry’s Oakley Street facility.
That work, Winnecke says, “allowed Berry to flourish and create the foundation for a really strong entity that will remain here for years to come.”
Berry, Winnecke says, “is a legacy corporation here in Evansville” like British and Dutch-owned Reckitt (known prior to 2017 as Mead Johnson) and, many years ago, Whirlpool Corp.
“People appreciate the fact that Berry has been a strong corporate citizen, active in philanthropy and the business community,” Winnecke says. “Our community, and Berry’s workforce, take great pride in that. We have every reason to think that will continue.”
The plastics manufacturer also announced Nov. 25 that it plans to sell its specialty tapes business to Rhode Island-based private equity firm Nautic Partners, LLC for approximately $540 million. A press release says Berry Global intends to use proceeds from the transaction to pay down outstanding debt.
