operator

maintenance technician

press operator

machine operator

feeder

Graphic Packaging International

I have been employed with Graphic Packaging International, through mergers, for nineteen years. I started as a temporary employee in 1995 upon being Honorably Discharged from the US Army. My typical day at work consists of meeting constant deadlines (projects, shipments), ensuring my associates are working safe and producing quality product while pushing production speed on equipment. I have to balance time spent on the production floor with time spent auditing production reports, employee issues/discipline, direct reports to upper management, attendance/vacation scheduling, answering customer complaints and working on Continuous Improvement projects which are reported out on a weekly basis. When I am on the production floor I complete hourly audits of each machine. Audits consist of employee safety, quality checks, machine speed and housekeeping. I also perform an operator production report audit on the production floor in addition to monitoring this from my office, which ensures the machine operator is entering data in a timely matter and there are no errors with their production report. This is done in between the standard hourly checks. I work a 12 hour rotating 4 on / 4 off schedule. I arrive to work 30-45 minutes early and leave 30-45 minutes after my shift is complete as I need time to complete shift reports and communicate issues to oncoming supervisor and Department Manager. My coworkers, which I would consider other supervisors, live this same ritual every day and I get along well with all of the other supervisors on my shift. Some minor disagreements transpire at times because I, being the senior off shift supervisor serve as acting Plant Manager. I am served with making decisions on maintenance and shipping priorities and sometimes this will cause a department supervisor to disagree with me based on his/her production expectations for that shift. I think the hardest part of my job is not being able to manage my time enough to become fully engaged with my employees. I sometimes feel like I have lost that personal touch with them that I had earlier in my career before I became a salaried employee. I try to reach out to each employee every day and ask them how they are doing but it is very difficult. The most enjoyable part of my job is when I can pat someone on the back and say "Great job!" They then know that I appreciate their effort and I can see that they feel good about themselves. We work in a high stress industry and I think management does an adequate job of communicating goals and issues to the production floor. My employees are, in my opinion, overworked and stressed out to the point where sometimes they are just going through the motions. This is dangerous for us as a company and leads to low morale. One of my biggest challenges is to motivate employees who are burned out.

Even though I have progressed rather quickly and make good money here, going any higher from where I am at is nearly impossible. The next step up for me is supervisor, but I can't get there unless I am the boss' buddy, and unless they actually promote their employees instead of hiring randos from other companies. No matter how qualified or trained we are for the role, they'd sooner wait for an outside applicant. Many have had better luck climbing the ladder by signing on with other companies and then signing back on with this one. Advancement opportunities are extremely rare. The benefits packages are bare minimum. There are absolutely no incentives whatsoever. This company keeps piling on the threats of losing your job but gives no reasons to stay or do well. I have spent over 2 years living their pockets with one of the highest performance and efficiency ratings and I have yet to receive any form of gratitude. No thank you, no good job, no well done. Just "Keep working or else". No sick days, one personal day that is not paid. Mandatory overtime (up to 60 hours/week+vacation coverage)(vacation coverage can lead to mandatory 84 hours/week for three weeks consecutively). Only 80 hours of vacation for the first 5 years. Schedule is not good for families, at all. There are two shifts, all day, or all night. You either work from sun up to sun down, or from sun down to sun up. 12 hour shifts on a 2-2-3 work bi-week schedule (2 days on, 2 days off, 3 days on, 2 days off, 2 days on, 3 days off). This company is so greedy that they offer zero bonuses. No attendance bonus, no yearly bonus, no holiday bonus, no profit sharing (which baffles me because it is a fortune 500 company). They don't provide tools to do the job, nor reimburse money spent on tools to do the work. Maintenance is lousy. All machines are slowly falling apart and they do nothing to fix anything. A multitude of safety issues that they refuse to address. A multitude of functionality issues that they throw duct tape at. You get fired if you get hurt, no matter the reason. A lady got fired for getting a small cut on one of her fingers (we work around a lot of sharp objects). Many people got fired for getting hurt because of a well-known safety problem that they have ignored since it happened. A man is trying to get reimbursed for a medical bill, which the company forced him to go to the hospital, that is only $120. They have spent over $9000 on lawyers and court fees trying to get out of paying this one small bill.
Corporate mindset=Wallets first, then... employees? Why do they matter?

I absolutely despise working here. The pay is all they offer and it is simply not enough to keep the employees happy.

Super long review

Decent work environment ,management can be shady sometimes and tend to get very abrasive when met with anything considered insubordinate. When issues are brought up that need substantial attention for proper operation of facilities the blame is placed on the employee for incopetence and unwillingness to adapt to a broken system 

as anyone thats worked in a situation similar you know that equipment can be dilapidated and not work as well as it should on paper. The supervisors are the main issue I feel there's a certain disconnect between them and the floor workers that needs tended to 

When supervisors asked about having more manpower or maintenance procedures (big preaching of preventative maintenence but is severely lacking) and these things that are well believed by floor staff to be beneficiary to the area to change and make things run smoother was met with a "that is not possible due to corporate policies" and when asked about who to speak to they would became vague and uncooperative

Overall floor employees are stellar and good to work with patient and helpful. Some supervisors though treat their position like a niche in high-school and handle employee feedback poorly 

Granted im not perfect i had a couple of write ups one for non positive attitude due to dangerous work standards (I.E. had a stack of pallets almost fall on me because you have to transport a 12 foot tall stack of pallets with a very badly designed system have to use multiple different controls in different areas to manipulatethe pallets and unless ran perfectly fails spectacularly) 

 and overloading of employees (i.e. six employees in a spot that only requires two people standardly and things still could not be pushed out fast enough to keep up with the lines product was literally hitting the floor because of the backup and had to be recycled which is an absolute waste of time resources and manpower)  

The second write up was for exclaiming WOO! at the end of a long and trying 12 hour shift total garbage imo and was not alone could hear other doing it at the same time yet was the only one written up because the supervisor felt I had a problem with her

I could go on all day but TL:DR 
Good floor employees can be tough sometimes but if you can keep your nose down and stay on the supervisors good side you can make a career of this place


This is a good job for somebody that does not want to do anything else with their life or on the side. They don't have your schedule until like thursday or friday for the following week. (it's been a few years since I worked there). It was hard to plan anything. Good luck trying to have another job or go to school at a campus with this job. They will switch you from one rotating 12 hour night shift to the other rotating 12 hour night shift. Then sometimes you will do a rotating 12 hour day shift despite having a night preference. Then you will be laid off no warning for about 1-3 weeks. Then you will come back and work a month of forced overtime. Then you might do 8 hour shifts for a while then back to 12s. 

Ok, having said that. This is a good job for someone without college. Expect to make $40,000ish in the starting position your first year, give or take depending how much OT you want to do and how many layoffs blah blah blah blah. They offer benefits and pay most of your monthly premium. I think they paid about 80% of my monthly premium for healthcare which I am finding out recently a lot of jobs don't even do that- you might as well be self employed basically w/ how much they make you pay wtf. It is pretty easy to move up in Graphic Packaging. This is a union company w/ a decent union imo. It is easy to move up positions/switch departments/ move up in pay. Unfortunately, with the Californication (cost of living rising) I would say that self employment or going back to school for the highest paid jobs is a better option. But if you're in a bind or want to make a career out of manufacturing/warehouse this is a really great place. The workers can be overly negative at this place. They'd been at GPI 100,000 years and don't have a clue how freaking terrible it is at most companies for peasants without a degree. This place is pretty easy to get hired at and hard to get fired. To get fired here you have to mess up really really badly.

Would I do it again? Probably not, simply because the scheduling is some of the worst scheduling you can possibly imagine. This job just takes over your whole life. It was too much! But some of these negative nancies online are full of it and probably even lazier than me (pretty hard to beat) LOL.

Pros
1.) If you live in Kenton, it is a 10 minute or less drive.
2.) The pay is "decent" with plenty of OT available.
3.) You only work 2 or 3 days before getting a day off.
4.) Even if you don't work an extra day, you get at least 4 hours of OT on each paycheck (12-hour people).
5.) 3rd highest paying manufacturing job in Kenton. 
6.) You can earn incentives for perfect attendance (extra vacay and points).
7.) Sign-on/retention bonus (as of now)
8.) Benefits start on the 1st of the month after the month you're hired (new).

Cons
1.) Insurance cost more than similar paying jobs in the surrounding area.
2.) No PTO and not much vacation especially for 12 hr shifts. 
3.) 12-hour shifts can be long
4.) It gets HOT!
5.) Constantly rotating workforce. They can't keep people. 
6.) Management is inexperienced. The plant manager is in his 20s! They don't want to pay for experience.  
7.) No smoking and smokers pay more for ins.
8.) You have to manually enter your clock number to clock in and out. No swipe cards. 

In summary I just want to say there are worse places to work. There are also better places to work, but if you live in Kenton and don't want to drive 30 minutes to a better job this is as good as it gets. 

This is the only place I've ever worked where I have to agree with the reviewers who gripe about management. Management at GPI is very young and very inexperienced. That's one of the biggest drawbacks. I appreciate a mature and knowledgeable workforce so much more after working here. 

Other than doing your job well there isn't much of a sense of pride. We make cups. They'll literally hire anybody. Not even a G.E.D. is required. If you have a pulse, you're in. I wish I was joking. 

I can't speak for other areas of the Kenton plant, but I work with a good group of people. The culture in that respect is great. 

The hardest part of the job for me is the equipment constantly breaking down. This seems to be a plant-wide issue. Running out of things needed to do the job effectively is a regular occurrence as well. These things just make any job harder than it has to be. 

The most enjoyable part of the job is being left alone as long as you get your work done. Do the work, do it right, nobody is breathing down your neck.     

The joy of a fat paycheck wears off quick....60-72 hours a week are the norm. Short notification window for daily OT and weekends. Treated like a child forced to wear a "mustache" net, goggles, and a hairnet even though the only food in the production area is the snacks snuck in by employees. The most mismanaged company I have ever worked for, really, it was shocking from screwed up paychecks, errors in attendance records, to no accountability....AT ALL!  Two overworked Supervisors for 200 employees leaves "seniority rules" prevalent.....that's where more senior co-workers tell you what to do as if they are your boss, only they have no leadership or communication skills and are generally more unhappy than you because the novelty of those paychecks wore off a looooong time ago. Complaints to the completely ignorant Human Resource department, all two of them, gets you nowhere as the senior employees have more needed skills than you will ever have because these miserable employees refuse to leave the company....EVER!   Oh, lets not forget the joke of a union they have out there.....understand, the printers union is dying, the president, vice president, office staff....all need their jobs so they will do the bidding of management. All management/union business is done over the phone between the clown at the top of the union and the clown in charge of Human Resources.....its supposed to be an adversarial relationship and yet these union stooges make arguments in support of management. Really, its amazing how talking to management yourself gets you more than talking to your union reps, who btw are those same miserable senior employees who don't want the boat rocked lest they lose all their hourly money and gravy benefits....money and benefits you will never receive because Corporate is forcing changes which include cutting back on wages and benefits. This place is a meat grinder....not worth the money....unless you're living in Mom's basement, smoking the devil's lettuce, while watching _____ on the internet...i.e...you don't have a life.

The job is very simple. You get a pallet of cartons and feed it into the machine. Then when you go to break you will rotate with someone else and go to the other end. Where you will feed boxes into the machine that will automatically fill up with the cartons that are being fed. The cartons being fed are sometimes tissue boxes, cereal boxes, bacon, spaghetti boxes. There is no food here just the cartons themselves. They are glued when entering the machine. But not fully enclosed. Just imagine a flattened cereal box where the top and bottom aren’t closed. During the back end where you put the boxes you will have to make sure the cartons arent damaged and inspect other parts every now and then. The schedule you have depends on what machine you work. Sometimes you will work continuously which means you will work 2 days rest 2 and work the weekend every other week. The days you do work will be 12 hour shifts. Atleast be making 48 hours a week. If you’re not continuous then you will be on an 8 hour machine which is 5 days 8 hours but the bad side to this schedule is if you don’t have a partner on another shift you will work 6 days a week. 

A really great reason to work here is there are so many job openings. You don’t need experience you just sign the sheet and you might get picked for the position. You don’t need to be working here for long to sign up. You can apply to be a forklift driver that earns $23 assistant operator that earns $23 but when finished training can earn $25 then there’s other positions such as offset (machine operator) where you can earn $27 an hour, or a cutting position making $25 but will get a raise every 6 months and will allow you to make $30. 

The downside to this is you will be forced to work 3rd shift in the beginning and if there’s an opening in other shifts you might get moved up depending on seniority. If you don’t mind working 3rd shift then this job is great. But when you start you will be 1st shift to train and when training finishes you will go to nights. 

I have 31 years experience in the printing industry GPI hired me to feed a press making $22.61 an hour after 3 months of being there they took me off the press and put me on an aerator making 19.30 an hour and put someone who has no printing experience on the press. To someone who has that much experience its an insult! The plant manager and the people in the office are nice when interviewing for a position but the minute you are hired they treat everyone like dirt talk to them like they are dogs! I would not recommend this company to anyone! The first chance I get I'm outta there I would rather live on the streets and eat out of a garbage can then work for this place! And I hope that GPI reads this you better start treating your employees better stop lying to them about their pay and positions you better remember without your employees your company would not exist the employees are the heart of any company and deserve better treatment along with respect they are not your punching bags or poo on the bottom of your shoes! I have worked in many printing companies I have never been treated so badly as I have at GPI! This company has put a toll on me mentally its beyond anything I could ever image! People must work to provide for their families put food on the table pay the bills that does not give any company the right to think they are better then those employees nor does it give you a right to mistreat them! You better get off your high horse stop looking down on people who are working hard to make you rich! Your employees work hard for you they deserve better treatment

Worst place I ever worked for in many years of working I don’t know if it was just the location but I absolutely hated it .A lot of rude people that work their and they don’t like training you . Morning shift is full of employees that been their for a long time and they are very rude to you and you can’t say nothing because they have sonority over you . They don’t honor sick days or Pto you can’t even request a day off and they give you only a 5 day vacation a year . so if you get sick that’s a point they don’t care they don’t take dr notes which they don’t tell you before you take the job they have a strict Attendence rule so if you single with no kids no family this is a perfect job for you . They go on a Thursday to Thursday schedule so you never know if you have to work the weekend untill Thursday. This company don’t explain everything before you accept the job please ask every question before you take the job offer also you only get 2, 10 min breaks and a 20 min lunch for your whole 8 hour shift of standing . The pay is good but to really see  a good check you have to work a lot of overtime because due to the union dues and the expensive insurance they offer a lot of money will be deducted out of your check they have very high insurances prices. I worked this job for a month I resigned it wasn’t nothing I imagined The job is easy but they over work you and always give you mandatory overtime at the last minute so you always have to make your self available for them don’t expect no life outside of here . Please  if you get a offer here ask every questions before you take the offer !!!!!

I was a group leader on a machine that applied glue on cereal and Kleenex cartons where I had 4 people under me. I had to organize employees/work flow for the day. Most of the pressure is on the group leader because everything is a reflection of you. I was responsible for ensuring that the machine stay running, paperwork,quality audits, and housekeeping. 
I was asked to be a fill in supervisor when a different supervisor was fired. I did this for 8 month's. I really enjoyed the position. I ran a crew of 20 people. I organized all work flow, Completed audits,attended meetings, completed mid shift and end of shift reports, ensured housekeeping and and training was complete when necessary. I learned a great deal there. How to trouble shoot equipment, computer work, patience, and hard work. The management was fairly week there. A lot of turnover and they would play favorites. The co-workers basically just looked out for themselves and there was no teamwork there and the morale was low. The hardest part of the job was having to deal with the constant pressure of being a group leader and producing good numbers and good quality. What I enjoyed the most was if you worked hard you could move up fast with the company. I became a group leader after 1.5 years. And that is hard to achieve in a factory where people have much more seniority than you. I was also very proud that they asked me to become a fill in supervisor.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Operator 15 salaries reported	$28.62 per hour
Maintenance technician 2 salaries reported	$35.53 per hour
Press operator 1 salary reported	$30.00 per hour
Machine operator 2 salaries reported	$22.05 per hour
Feeder 1 salary reported	$20.94 per hour

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