Euro Supply Chain 2024

EILS, Alsace's packaging specialist on the rise thanks to made-to-measure products The SME will be exhibiting for the first time at Euro Supply Chain in June. To find out more.

The company's growth is based on its ability to provide industrial customers with a customized offer for packaging their products in wooden crates of all shapes and sizes, with associated logistics services. Located simultaneously in the Bas-Rhin and Haut-Rhin regions, for local coverage of Alsace, the company will be exhibiting for the first time this year at Euro Supply Chain, on June 11 at the Parc Expo in Mulhouse.

“Customization is our trademark. Julien Stengel, Administrative and Financial Director of EILS, has little difficulty in finding a key word to characterize the Alsatian wood packaging company. Since it was founded in 2007 by packaging and logistics professionals, this family-run SME has set out to defy the laws of geometry, offering its local and regional industrial customers solutions specifically adapted to the shipment of their products of various shapes and sizes. The crates manufactured by the company's 85-strong workforce at its two sites - Erstein (Bas-Rhin) and Tagolsheim (Haut-Rhin) - ensure that the parts concerned are held, protected and wedged in the best possible way.

“In this way, we find ways of keeping empty case space to a minimum, an essential factor in optimizing costs for our customers,” points out Julien Stengel, who emphasizes the presence of a design office to ensure tailor-made design. In the case of customers, production is more industrialized, without falling into standard mass production.
The EILS acronym underlines the broad scope of its services: Emballages Industriels Logistique & Services. “Logistics upstream of dispatch is an integral part of our offer, just as important as the manufacture of the cases themselves”, continues the Administrative and Financial Director. 

This logistics service includes storage, order preparation, packaging, delegation of production and organization of transport with the customer's service provider. In most cases, EILS employees work on site at the industrial loader's premises, with a dedicated workforce ranging from 2 to 8 people, depending on the volumes entrusted. 
Thanks to the expertise of our EILS teams, a wide range of products are not only put on the road, but also on the sea, in the air or on the railroads. From small individual parts to imposing turbine sub-assemblies, they come in a wide range of sizes and express the full diversity of the region's manufacturing industry. 

 A regional wood supply 
The crates have to adapt to this diversity, resulting in extensive production facilities in Erstein and Tagolsheim, on a total of 27,000 m2 of land and 8,000 m2 of covered buildings. The capacity of EILS' overhead cranes ranges from 5 to 40 tons, and that of its forklifts from 3 to 16 tons. The packaging is made of panels from wood sourced “97%” from sawmills in Alsace, certified PEFC (Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification schemes). 
This underscores the company's commitment to “short circuits”, which is another of the SME's hallmarks. It aims to serve the regional economy, thanks to its network of sites in the two départements. The company's influence extends throughout Alsace, with additional markets in the German regions of Kehl-Ortenau and Weil-am-Rhein, in Basel and the surrounding area, and a little further afield in Switzerland. 

This origin underlines the quest for “short circuits” by which the SME also strives to characterize itself. It aims to serve the regional economy, thanks to its network of sites in the two departments. The company's influence extends throughout Alsace, with additional markets in the German regions of Kehl-Ortenau and Weil-am-Rhein, in Basel and the surrounding area, and a little further afield in Switzerland. 

Environmental initiatives are also a priority. This is reflected in the insulation of the vast Tagolsheim roofs, to be completed in 2023, and, on the machinery side, in the gradual conversion of forklift trucks to electric propulsion. 
This alchemy forms a growing whole. Since EILS' inception, sales have grown almost uninterruptedly. Last year, it stood at 11.5 million euros, after 10.8 million two years ago and 8.8 million euros in 2019 before the Covid crisis. 

Article written by Christian Robischon, journalist at Traces Ecrites News.Read the article in French on their website.