rose plastic — Inside Washington County
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Bob Kramer grew up in the Steel City during the steel era and the Steelers’ ascent. He was a Carrick kid, nurtured in the ’60s and ’70s in the hillside community overlooking Saw Mill Run Boulevard. Whether it was baseball, basketball or life, Kramer developed a steely resolve to succeed.
He stayed close to home for college, graduating from Robert Morris University’s esteemed School of Business, then succeeded in business by really trying. Kramer worked and moved up, and often moved on, relocating nine times because of jobs. Along the way, he married a woman from Carrick, raised three children, celebrated births of six grandchildren and became a corporate leader. But, for the better part of four decades, Kramer returned to Pittsburgh only for an occasional visit.
That changed in October, when he left a secure position — vice president of global operations with a Virginia firm — to seize an opportunity near his roots. Kramer became interim vice president of sales for rose plastic USA, based at California Technology Park, with the assurance he would succeed Ken Donahue as president upon his retirement two months later.
Returning “home” was alluring, but that was not Kramer’s primary motivation for relocating. A high-level job was available with a high-level firm that had a lower-case name.
“Pittsburgh was a big attraction, but the No. 1 thing was the assignment,” Kramer, 61, said with an easy smile. “It was a perfect fit at the time and I liked being ‘home.'”
The parent of his new employer, rose plastic AG, is a global force, a top manufacturer of plastic packaging for the tooling industry. The company is headquartered in Hergensweiler, Germany, and has 7,000 employees at five locations: Brazil, China, India, Western Pennsylvania and Germany.
His division serves all of North America. “Our primary market here is (packaging) cutting metal tools,” said Kramer, who is in charge of a workforce of about 100 in the 22-year-old California park, where rose plastic USA is an original tenant.
That number will grow along with the local operation, as the company is building a medical-packaging facility on site, one that will provide the cleanest of plastic products. Kramer said employees there will adhere to more stringent Class 8 and Class 9 requirements in developing packaging for medical equipment that has been manufactured elsewhere. The equipment includes screws, large sharp medical objects and other medically related items.
“This will be a separate entity with a separate website by the end of the year,” said Kramer, who will supervise that entity, rose medical packaging USA. “We expect to be producing by the fourth quarter (of 2019).” He anticipates adding about 10 employees to the medical building over the next two years.
The medical operation is an ambitious endeavor for rose plastic AG, which has one existing medical-packaging building, in Germany. Erecting a second one, in California Technology Park, was no surprise considering the potential of this project. There is a large demand for what rose plastics can supply.
“They (global headquarters) saw the U.S. market as being larger, so a medical facility here was a natural move,” Kramer said. “There are so many medical cutting tools manufacturers. And it’s a fact that medical markets are pretty much recession-proof, something you can rely on.
“I think medical will become the biggest emphasis for us. Our biggest challenge will be finding customers who want to team up with a cleaner environment. We’re going for customers in a higher-profile market.”
Kramer said Latrobe-based Kennametal, a large global toolmaker, is one of rose plastic’s biggest customers.
It has been a low-profile homecoming for Kramer, who has been absorbed in his work the past eight months. But he and his wife, Julie, are becoming acclimated following this most recent relocation, No. 9. They are building a house in the Alto Piano plan in Cecil Township. “She has been a real trooper,” Kramer said.
Although he doesn’t serve on any boards, Kramer said that once he settles into the job — and the medical building is fully operational — he probably will become active in the community.
This city native has endearing memories of his early life in Carrick. He attended St. Basil, a Catholic high school in the neighborhood, until it closed in 1976, following his junior year. Kramer then graduated from Carrick High, where he played baseball and basketball. That last year, Kramer competed against City League rival Brashear and its superstar, Sam Clancy.
His career has included an 18-year stint with PPG, where he was introduced to plastics, and a stretch with Klöckner Pentaplast, a German firm that is a top supplier of films for pharmaceutical, medical devices, food, electronics and general packaging.
Thus far, this corporate veteran has been impressed by his new company, a third-generation family operation that is privately run and “extremely employee-friendly.” The rose in rose plastic, he said, is a shortened form of the family name Rosler; roses are the key feature in the corporate symbol. As for the lower-case usage . . . Kramer surmises that “(European countries) don’t capitalize the way we do.”
“It’s a very well run organization, a very well established organization,” he said. “We’re well known for what we do. We have very low employee turnover and have a lot of experienced people.
“For me, I want to take something that’s well run and make it better through what I can do.”
Bob Kramer is feeling at home in his job, back on his home turf.