Sixty Years in the Making, and Just Getting Started

Winchester, Virginia. 1966

My grandfather, George "Pete" Duane, founded Chem-Pak in Winchester, Virginia in 1966 with a straightforward conviction: that brands deserved a manufacturing partner they could truly trust. Someone who would treat their product as carefully as their own. In the aerosol industry of the mid-1960s, that kind of reliability wasn't always easy to find.

He built something from nothing: a facility, a team, a reputation. Over the years, Chem-Pak grew into a name that America's leading brands could count on. Customer relationships deepened. The operation expanded. My grandfather's bet was paying off.

Then came December 20, 1999.

The Fire

Five days before Christmas, a devastating fire tore through the Chem-Pak facility at 11 Oates Avenue in Winchester. It was a moment that would have broken a lot of companies. Everything that had been built over 33 years, the equipment, the infrastructure, the physical foundation of the business, was gone.

My grandfather Pete and my father Randy faced a choice that no family should have to face: walk away from what they'd built, or start over.

They chose to start over

That decision, made under the worst possible circumstances, says everything about who they were and what this company stands for. They didn't just rebuild what they had lost. They found new land, and they built something better. A state-of-the-art facility designed from the ground up, with the hard lessons of experience built into every decision. They weren't going to be caught unprepared again.

By August 23, 2000, less than eight months after the fire, they broke ground on that brand new facility here in West Virginia. When I look at that groundbreaking photo in the newspaper clipping, I don't just see a new construction site. I see an act of perseverance. I see two men who refused to let something extraordinary be extinguished.

The People Who Made It Possible

A 60th anniversary isn't just a company milestone. It's a people milestone. And when I look around this building, I see that clearly.

We have team members who have been with Chem-Pak for decades, some of whom were here through the fire and the rebuild, who chose to come back and be part of what came next. People who have poured real commitment into this place, who know our lines and our customers the way only long-tenured professionals can. And alongside them, we have newer faces bringing fresh energy and a hunger to build something great.

To every person who has worked here, past and present, this anniversary belongs to you as much as it does to our family. The resilience of this company is inseparable from the resilience of the people in it. Thank you.

What Six Decades Teaches You

Sixty years teaches you that quality is never negotiable. That shortcuts compound into problems. That the best customer relationships are built slowly, through years of showing up and doing exactly what you said you would do.

It also teaches you that the market never stops changing. The aerosol industry of 2026 looks very different from the one my grandfather entered in 1966: new formulations, new regulatory landscapes, new customer expectations around speed, transparency, and scale. Standing still has never been an option.

But perhaps the deepest lesson is this: no matter what gets taken from you, you can rebuild. Better, if you're willing to learn. That's not just our company history. That's our operating philosophy.

The Next Chapter

I want to be honest about something: I'm more excited about the next ten years of Chem-Pak than I am nostalgic about the last sixty. And that's saying something.

We've spent the past several years investing deliberately in our people, our capabilities, and the infrastructure that lets us serve customers at a higher level than ever before. Our LaunchPath commercialization program is the most structured, transparent product-launch process we've ever offered. Our liquid manufacturing capabilities have expanded significantly. Our R&D and regulatory teams are stronger than they've ever been.

And this year, we completed the implementation of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance & Operations, our new enterprise platform. It was a significant undertaking, and I won't pretend it was easy. ERP implementations never are. But it was the right investment. D365 F&O gives us the operational backbone to scale: real visibility across the business, the infrastructure to grow our customer base, and the systems to support the ambitious goals we've set for the decades ahead.

My grandfather and father rebuilt this company once from ashes. We're building it now from strength. The foundation has never been more solid.

Grateful, and Ready

If my grandfather Pete were here today, I think he'd be proud. Not just of what we've built, but of the fact that we're still building. That the spirit that drove him to start over in the hardest of moments is still alive in this place.

To our customers: thank you for trusting us with your products and your brands. That trust is not something we take lightly. Not a single order, not a single project, not a single conversation. It means everything to us.

To our team: the best chapter is the one we haven't written yet. Let's go write it.

Here's to sixty more.