中文Advance Paper Box, an independent folding carton manufacturer based in Winnipeg, Manitoba, has purchased a new Koenig & Bauer Rapida 106, a 41-inch seven-color press with coater, in what the company describes as the largest single capital investment in its more than 50-year history. The acquisition modernizes the pressroom and expands the range of work the family-owned business can take on for brand owners across North America.
The Rapida 106 represents a significant capability upgrade for a company that has spent half a century building custom-designed folding cartons for all kinds of consumer goods. A seven-color press with an inline coater allows Advance Paper Box to deliver extended color gamut work without dedicated spot inks, matching a far wider range of brand colors through process-color simulation. That capability directly answers what the company says its customers have been asking for: more colors, faster turnaround times, and job analytics across all of their work.
Extended color gamut has become a strategic priority for carton converters serving brand owners with multi-SKU initiatives. Rather than maintaining inventories of specialty spot inks for each client, a seven-color configuration lets a converter reproduce a broader palette on demand, reducing both lead times and consumable complexity. The inline coater further expands the finishing options available in a single pass, supporting the high-end decorative effects that premium consumer packaging increasingly demands.
The leadership team behind the investment reads like a family-business roster: Gerry Choquette, president and chief executive, is joined by Jared Choquette, chief operating officer, Yeti Biroue, chief financial officer, and Tricia Choquette, director of sales. Their visible presence at the announcement underscores the continuity of ownership and the long-term commitment the purchase represents.
For Advance Paper Box, the Rapida 106 is both a productivity play and a market-positioning move. Modern folding-carton buyers expect shorter runs, tighter color tolerances and faster delivery than were standard even a decade ago. A press of this caliber signals to national brand owners that a regional converter can compete on quality and speed, not merely on price. It also future-proofs the operation against the gradual consolidation of carton capacity, where only the most capable plants capture the most demanding accounts.
Koenig & Bauer’s Rapida 106 is a mainstay of the high-end sheetfed offset market, prized for its speed, register accuracy and automation. The 41-inch format is well suited to larger carton blanks, and the seven-color plus coater configuration is a common choice for converters moving up the value chain. The fact that an independent Canadian carton maker chose to make this its single largest investment speaks to the confidence independent printers still place in premium offset technology even as digital alternatives proliferate.
The purchase also reflects a broader truth about the folding-carton sector: demand for fiber-based packaging continues to grow as brands substitute paperboard for plastic in everything from food service to cosmetics. Converters that invest in flexible, high-quality sheetfed capacity are positioning themselves to capture that substitution wave. Advance Paper Box’s half-century milestone, marked by its biggest-ever bet on equipment, suggests the family intends to be a player in the next fifty years as well.
Source: PrintCAN (www.printcan.com), “Advance Paper Box Buys A Rapida 106 Press,” 15 September 2026.
The Winnipeg investment is also a vote of confidence in Canadian folding-carton capacity at a moment when North American packaging supply chains are being reshaped by near-shoring and sustainability mandates. Regional carton converters that can offer national brand owners both quality and responsiveness stand to gain as companies diversify away from distant, single-source suppliers. A 50-year-old independent making its largest-ever commitment suggests the next chapter of carton manufacturing in the region will be written by firms willing to modernize aggressively rather than coast on tenure.
There is also a workforce dimension. A press of this sophistication attracts and retains skilled operators, a meaningful consideration in a labour market where experienced sheetfed talent is in demand. By signalling investment, Advance Paper Box positions itself as an employer of choice and a partner serious brands can trust with complex, colour-critical work. The seven-color plus coater configuration further future-proofs the plant against the gradual shift toward shorter, more customised carton runs, where flexibility matters as much as raw throughput. For brand owners juggling multi-SKU launches, a converter that can deliver extended-gamut colour and fast changeovers under one roof reduces their own supplier complexity. Advance Paper Box’s half-century milestone, marked by its single largest commitment to equipment, is therefore less a celebration of the past than a down payment on relevance in a packaging market being reshaped by sustainability mandates and near-shoring alike.
Independently owned carton converters like Advance Paper Box occupy a distinct niche in a market increasingly dominated by large, consolidated groups. Their agility, local service and willingness to handle bespoke work for regional brands are advantages that national scale cannot always match. A major press investment signals that the family intends to defend that niche with firepower, not just goodwill. For the Winnipeg business community, the purchase is also an anchor of confidence in local manufacturing at a time when cross-border supply chains are being re-examined. The Rapida 106 is, in that sense, both a machine and a statement about the next fifty years of the company.
