Five Ways Packaging & Paper Organisations Can Strengthen Customer Relationships
Long-term partnerships: the gold standard for the Packaging & Paper industry. But one that’s becoming increasingly difficult to reach amid the backdrop of rising energy and raw-material costs and ongoing trade and supply chain uncertainty.
Despite these challenges, data from The Relationship Rating (TRR) shows that sector ratings have consistently risen from 7.92 in 2021 to 8.33 in 2025. The top performers have achieved this by moving beyond transactional relationships. The real question is: how?
Data from our recent report, Unlocking the Commercial Power of Customer Relationships in the Packaging & Paper Industry, highlights the answer: relationships. They are one of the most powerful drivers of commercial performance. Yet they are consistently underutilised by organisations trying to bridge the customer satisfaction gap.
We have identified five ways organisations can strengthen relationships and stand out in a crowded industry.
1. Move From Customer Satisfaction Tracking to Relationship Intelligence
Customer feedback is vital, and many organisations track it using customer satisfaction score (CSAT) or net promoter score NPS as key KPI’s. However, gathering metrics is often seen as the end, when it should be a starting point.
That’s where relationship intelligence comes into play.
Customer feedback is vital – but in many B2B packaging organisations, it is still treated as an endpoint rather than a catalyst for action. While CSAT and NPS remain important KPIs, leading organisations are moving beyond simple measurement toward relationship intelligence: a more dynamic approach to understanding, managing, and strengthening customer relationships over time.
2. Strengthen the Human Advantage
While customers cite product quality and supply performance as the most important factors, these are expectations – not differentiators. Framed within Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs as applied to B2B customer relationships, they serve as the foundation upon which stronger partnerships are built.
Insert image of Maslow’s Hierarchy applied to B2B customer relationships
Our report shows that when product or quality issues arise, the average TRR is 6.27, but when those same issues are present and the relationship is praised, it rises to 7.52. This figure emphasises the role of the relationship and how it can buffer operational stress.
What’s more, the report highlights that customers see people (individuals and teams) as a point of difference, with words like ‘professional’, ‘collaboration’ and ‘reliable’ being used to describe the top performers. This is unsurprising, given that 83% of UK consumers prefer to interact with a human rather than a chatbot.
As such, organisations need to invest in talent and customer-facing capabilities and train teams to focus on clear communication and proactive problem-solving. While at the same time, showcasing technical expertise that demonstrates a deep understanding of the customer’s world.
3. Make Service Excellence Non-Negotiable
When thinking about service excellence, customer service and sales are likely the first things that come to mind. In reality, creating positive customer relationships that endure hinges on your ability to extend service excellence to all corners of your operation.
Tickets resolved per hour, agent touches and average handle time remain important, but they don’t accurately reflect the customer experience. That’s why the most successful Packaging & Paper organisations focus on something else: measuring and rewarding service and responsiveness.
Our research shows that whilst (potentially as expected), top quartile companies are 70% more likely to receive praise for product quality, they are also 3x less likely to attract complaints aboutMeanwhile, inconsistent service, slow responses and complex processes erode trust and drive lower ratings, underscoring the foundation of true partnerships. Partnerships aren’t built on the number of queries closed or tickets handled, but on the quality of each interaction demonstrating that an organisation cares.
4. Treat Issue Management as a Differentiator
In B2B packaging organisations, how you manage issues can be as important as how you deliver product – making it a true point of differentiation. Leading organisations empower frontline teams to resolve problems quickly, with clear ownership, transparent updates, and realistic timelines that build trust rather than frustration. For example, when a delivery delay occurs, high-performing teams don’t wait for customers to chase, they immediately notify impacted customers, explain the root cause (e.g. production bottleneck or logistics disruption), provide a revised delivery date, and offer mitigation options such as partial shipments or alternative sites. During disruptions, proactive communication protocols (such as daily status updates or named single points of contact) reinforce reliability and control. Most importantly, teams are trained to treat these moments not as exceptions to be solved quickly, but as opportunities to strengthen relationships – demonstrating responsiveness, accountability, and a genuine commitment to partnership when it matters most.
5. Elevate Strategic Customer Conversations
Organisations seeking to move beyond transactional relationships, and in doing so avoid transactional drag, have to stop getting weighed down in the day-to-day discussions and shift towards a more influential long-term relationship.
Elevating customer conversations beyond the transactional is essential to unlocking long-term value. Leading organisations anchor relationships at a senior level -establishing executive touchpoints and tailored communication cadences for strategic or at-risk accounts, ensuring discussions happen consistently, not just when issues arise. For example, structured Quarterly Business Reviews bring together procurement, operations, and leadership to review performance, align on priorities, and identify growth opportunities. Crucially, the most effective teams shift the dialogue away from price and reactive problem-solving toward future-focused value. This often involves co-developing solutions in close partnership with customers, such as redesigning pack formats to optimise logistics efficiency, jointly developing more sustainable materials, or improving cost-to-serve through smarter specifications. By co-creating and clearly tracking progress against these initiatives, organisations move from supplier to strategic partner – strengthening trust, protecting revenue, and expanding scope.
In Summary: Don’t ignore one of your most powerful levers
To truly find competitive differentiation and strategic advantage, organisations need to put relationship management at the heart of their strategy. By embracing relationship intelligence, empowering teams and prioritising strategic relationship management, organisations can gain a commercial advantage, where churn is less frequent and profit margins are healthier.
Ultimately, these efforts help organisation grow profitably and build resilient partnerships that are anything but paper thin.
Ready to take a deeper look into the characteristics of top-performing Packaging & Paper organisations? Read our report on Unlocking the Commercial Power of Customer Relationships in the Packaging & Paper Industry.
