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| The author with Ramkumar |
Toronto is the most populous city of Canada with the almost 6
million people in greater Toronto Area and a large chunk are immigrants from
across the world, a substantial number also from India. The weather in Toronto
varies from as low as -30 degrees Celsius to a high of +30-35 degrees in summer.
For this reason, summer is something that the Toronto based Canadians love and
dread the frosty winters. Towards end of summer 2018 in the first week of
October, the author got to meet for breakfast with Ram whose full name is Ram
Ramkumar, a partner in a successful growing and leading label manufacturing
company, ASL Print FX originally called All Stick Labels. Toronto has a fair
number of Indians in the label industry. The first question that came to mind
was why his name had Ram twice in it. Well the answer was fairly simple, in his
family the father’s name comes first followed by the person’s name. He had been
named Ramkumar and his father’s name was Ramamritham so actually Ram’s full
name is Ramamritham Ramkumar which in Canada was shortened to Ram Ramkumar.
Ram’s father Ramamritham born in 1917 passed his electrical
engineering from The Indian Institute of Science Bangalore in 1938. Thereafter
he joined HAL (Hindustan Aeronautics Limited) who in those days were building gliders
that were employed in the second World war by the British. Later while working
for the Tata’s Dumdum Airport in Kolkata he got a scholarship to pursue his
Masters in Aeronautical Engineering from New York University. He qualified as
India’s 2nd Aeronautical engineer. He spent a year of training at
Boeing in Seattle before returning home to join the civil aviation department
in 1948. He was subsequently elevated to be Director General of Civil Aviation
(DGCA). He retired in 1976. Ram’s elder brother who also graduated from the
Indian Institute of Science migrated to UK to complete his doctorate in
metallurgy from Imperial college of Science in London. He then took employment
in various organisations viz. Atomic Energy Commission USA. He moved to Canada
in 1971 to work for International Nickel Company INCO and returned home to run
steel rolling mill owned by his in-laws. He came back to Canada around
1997
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| The ASL Print FX Facility in Toronto |
Ram Ramkumar born in 1951 did his initial schooling in MEA
High School in Delhi also known as “Madrasi School” followed by metallurgical
engineering from IIT(Indian Institute of Technology) Kanpur in 1972, then moved
to Canada to pursue MBA from the university of Toronto and did not return back
to India after that. He started to work for an accounting firm Clarkson Gordon
which later became a part of Ernst & Young for the next 7 years, initially
for 4years in audit and later 3 years in business valuation. In the process of
business auditing his first client was a person named Robert Zoeblein who saw
huge potential in Ram and started to mentor him in running business. 7 years
later Robert reached out to Ram and hired him as General Manager of his wooden
furniture manufacturing company REFF, to set up systems to run the company
efficiently with aim to go public. Post the public issue, flush with funds and
wanting to expand, they bought controlling interest in a friend’s Metal
furniture manufacturing company. Ram became a shareholder and President of the
metal furniture manufacturing company. Their fruitful efforts brought results
such that their share price escalated substantially, moving ahead Robert and
his partners sold the company REFF to a US based company and they acquired the
remaining shares of the Metal furniture company. Sales grew from 20 million in
1989 to 170 million CAD in 2001. In 2004 the accountant cum management skills in
Ram resurfaced and there was yearning to change, so he retired from that
business and became an investor.
In 2008 he and his friend Bob invested along with another
friend Charlie (CEO) and Stacy (VP Operations) to acquire balance of shares
owned by the founder of a flexographic printer which had been founded in 1965. Charlie
and Stacy are running the business while the other two are investors. They
renamed the entity as ASL Print FX as it exists now. This was Ram’s entry into
the colourful world of labels!
The four partners have constantly put in hard and dedicated
efforts to drive growth into this venture. Over the years they enhanced the
label production and decorative capabilities to include use of special inks,
special varnishes to give textures, embossing and debossing, hot/cold foiling,
100% inspection/defect detection, fully integrated colour management systems,
captive plate making and an inhouse ink kitchen. Sustainability and
environmental concerns are taken care of by using FSC certified and recyclable
materials. Flexo and digital printing capabilities makes it possible for them to
cater to both long run and short run job demands. Additionally, they have a label
manufacturing facility in North Carolina USA. In around 2012 they added
envelope manufacturing in Toronto. Looking at the potential of creativity and
growing demand of wine labels they have recently setup another label production
facility in Napa Valley, the wine producing region on the US west coast for
production of wine labels. Whenever the unit faced challenges the partners
decided to upgrade equipment with increased automation in production equipment
and in workflow to achieve increased productivity and efficiency. Each week the
four partners meet to monitor the operations closely. They believe that if
their team does not hit the target decided, it is imperative to bring about a
change. All jobs in the company are evaluated for the time spent on it along
with profitability achieved. They review the targeted cost and actual cost of
production constantly. They are a highly awarded company as their labels have won
at various global competitions. They have ten fully loaded flexo presses that
include Gallus, hybrid MPS additionally they have digital printing capability
through an affiliate having HP indigo digital label press, they operate out of
almost 50,000 square feet of shop floor and a workforce of almost 100 persons
from three locations i.e. Toronto, Winston Salem North Carolina and Napa
California.
Ram’s wife is a home maker and they have two sons. The elder
Nikhil 41 years old with background as a copy writer in advertising, now
works as a Manager of Communications. Nikhil has four children aged 8 years, 6 years, 3 years and 3 months. The
younger son Ajay 35 years old is a lawyer.
As regards the
label business Ram believes that growth especially in a complex business,
like printing, is happening due to a commitment to continuing investments in
the best equipment, excellent employees and pursuit of excellence.
Written by Harveer Sahni, Chairman Weldon Celloplast Limited New
Delhi January 2020.
