Hardware Podcasts

344 - CERM user group with Trent Bremer from Grand Rapids Label

People of Packaging · 6 Apr 2026 · 19m

AI in practice: 2 real uses of AI described

What this episode covers

Trent Bremer, VP of Operations & Finance at Grand Rapids Label, discusses the company's 142-year legacy and its transition from a 40-year-old homegrown system to implementing Serm ERP. He details the technical challenges of producing durable automotive labels and direct food-contact items like ice cream cone sleeves, emphasizing the need for strict certifications. Bremer also explores the practical applications of AI in their operations, specifically for forecasting customer order patterns and automating EDI mapping for automotive clients.

AI in practice

Where this conversation describes AI being used to build or deliver a product. Part of the AI in practice tracker.

Running the companySerm (Lexus AI)40-week forecasts

The company is using AI to forecast customer order patterns for automotive labels, analyzing 40-week forecasts to identify inconsistencies and predict if a product line is ending rather than just missing an order.

“we do a lot with forecasting, so trying to understand what our customer forecasts are, an automotive, we can get 402 week forecasts. So trying to do some modeling of understanding, customer order patterns, and can we see, you know, hey, 6 weeks out. There's a, you know, we're seeing, we're not seeing an order for it.”

Trent Bremer · Hear it at 12:56

Running the companySerm (Lexus AI)

The team is exploring using AI to automate EDI mapping for inbound automotive orders, allowing the system to learn from previous mappings to recreate or eliminate manual map creation for new customers.

“we do, in the automotive, we do a lot of inbound EDI orders, and so there's a certain amount of mapping that we're going through to onboard customers. So can you start using AI to learn, hey, I mapped almost an identical one before. Can I use AI to essentially recreate another map?”

Trent Bremer · Hear it at 12:56

Most relevant to

established companies

Topics

Mentioned

Companies
Grand Rapids Label, WS Packaging, Blue Label Packaging
Tools
Serm, NetSuite, Lexus AI

Related episodes from other shows

Other shows on the same ground, closest first.

The summary, chapters and topics are generated from the episode’s audio by this directory, not written by People of Packaging. The episode itself belongs to its publisher.