Arnold Packaging: Thriving Through Innovation
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By DERON SNYDER (as published by Port of Baltimore Magazine)
A family business doesn’t last for 90 years and through four generations of leaders in an everchanging field without navigating and initiating disruptive innovation. No one has to convince Mick Arnold of that fact.
What began in 1933 as Arnold’s Factory Supplies — a Baltimore maker of adhesives and inks for packaging materials — has since evolved into Arnold Packaging, a comprehensive firm that designs and supplies innovative packaging solutions and automation systems to optimize customers’ shipping, storage and production processes.
“The company obviously was a lot smaller under my grandfather, when we made glues and mineral pigments,” said Arnold, who became company president in 1995 after his father’s death. “Transportation wasn’t very good and things were manufactured a lot closer to point of use. You didn’t think of handing off to UPS or FedEx and competing in a market that was two or three states away, let alone on the other side of the Mississippi.”
Today, Arnold Packaging has 82 employees and the firm has boomed since 2020. “We doubled the size of the business from 2018 to 2022,” Arnold said.
Like Father, Like Son
Since taking control at age 25, Arnold oversaw the company’s first acquisition, a Virginia-based firm in 2011; expanded into more geographic markets in 2012; and launched the first breakout division, Arnold Automation, in 2017. In 2021, he moved the firm to an 80,000 square-foot facility at Tradepoint Atlantic, after 89 years within the same Baltimore ZIP code (21230).
“We started as a packaging distributor with limited knowledge on robotics and autonomous vehicles,” Arnold said. “Now we’ve built out a team that has 11 engineers and is our fastest-growing division. Let’s say creating the automation division is probably our No.1 move.”
In fact, he said, “our automation business will pretty soon overtake our container manufacturing business, which we’ve been doing for 60 years. It’s going to run it down and catch it — that’s how fast automation is growing.”
His father, George Arnold, engineered master strokes of his own, like entering the wood box business by luring a key employee from local aviation giant Glenn L. Martin Co. in the 1960s. “My dad hired their box shop foreman,” Arnold said. “Companies like them and Westinghouse were making planes and aerospace parts. They were so big, those companies had their own packaging divisions and box plants. When that shifted, we were in position to pick up that business and continue to grow it over the years.”
Arnold praises his father for being ahead of the curve, investing in machinery and equipment to make wood and corrugated shipping containers before manufacturing giants like 3M, Northrop Grumman and Bethlehem Steel sought local channels for distribution. George Arnold’s experience and relationships helped propel his firm to the fore among Baltimore packaging companies.
“The cutting-edge piece for him was being in a position to sign as the local distributor for the biggest and best manufacturers in the country,” Arnold said.
A ‘Really Cool Space’
A youngster when he started spending time at the business — mostly during school holidays — Arnold began working there at age 13. He enjoyed his time in the warehouse and manufacturing, building containers for military and aerospace products. As he grew, he systematically learned all aspects of the firm. Arnold didn’t view it as work then and still doesn’t today.
“My father taught me and showed me all the really cool parts of the business,” Arnold said. “Packaging is a really cool space. We have 800 customers who are making and distributing things in all different types of industry. On the end of the line, how do they get their widgets from point A to point B? And it’s all types of widgets: bombs, missiles, weapons, garments, e-commerce, steel cookie tins … you name it. We work with them every day.”
Arnold is proud that many employees have been with his company for over two decades, while “another 13 teammates are between the ages of 22 and 34. So we have some young talent, a lot of engineering talent.
Arnold said many of the firm’s bigger expenditures are in manufacturing and automation, including an investment to change the production facility’s workflow in 2025. Additional major investments are slated for software upgrades in each of the company’s six divisions. “We’re getting rid of a lot of paper and transactional intensity,” he said.
He said Arnold Packaging enjoys working with Port of Baltimore officials. “We’ve got some friends over there and a lot of mutual customers,” he said. “We support a lot of companies that are bringing products in through the Port or exporting out of Baltimore. We’ve got a great touchdown space and engineering expertise to get it from here to there without damage.”
