2008 Bemis Annual Report About Bemis Bemis Company, Inc. is a worldwide supplier of flexible packaging and pressure sensitive materials used by leading food, consumer products, manufacturing, and other companies. Bemis maintains a strong balance sheet and a focused dedication to creating a competitive advantage for its customers and businesses. These business imperatives complement the Company’s robust commitment to provide proven, leading-edge products and processes to customers, and to continue to develop new, innovative solutions for today’s marketplace. Bemis is organized around two major business segments: flexible packaging and pressure sensitive materials. The flexible packaging business has a strong technical base in polymer chemistry, film extrusion, coating and laminating, printing, and converting. The Company’s pressure sensitive materials business specializes in adhesive technologies. For over 150 years, Bemis’ unwavering dedication to a sustainable business strategy has resulted in a successful, agile organization that is and will remain: ! A business committed to demonstrating the highest level of ethics and integrity possible in internal and external interactions ! A valued supplier of quality products ! An employer providing a challenging and satisfying work experience for employees ! A rewarding investment for shareholders ! A responsible member of the communities in which it operates Letter to Shareholders 2 Product Innovation 6 Bemis Strengths 8 Business Segments 10 Eleven-Year Summary 12 Bemis Officers 14 Board of Directors 15 Global Operations 16 Form 10-K insert Shareholder Information ibc Bemis At-A-Glance ! Global supplier ! Over 70% of Bemis products are used in food and consumer goods markets ! $3.8 billion net sales in 2008 ! 15,400 employees worldwide ! Organized around two market segments: Flexible Packaging ! 57 facilities • food & consumer ! 10 countries • health & hygiene • medical & pharmaceutical ! 26 consecutive years of increased • industrial annual dividend payments Pressure Sensitive Materials ! Dividends paid annually since 1922 • retail graphics & signage ! Over 150 years in business • labels ! NYSE: BMS • technical adhesive applications Financial Highlights Years Ended December 31, (dollars in thousands, except per share amounts) 2008 2007 % Change SALES AND EARNINGS Net sales $ 3,779,373 $ 3,649,281 3.6% Income before income taxes 262,514 285,854 -8.2% Provision for income taxes 96,300 104,300 -7.7% Net income 166,214 181,554 -8.4% PER SHARE Basic earnings per share $ 1.67 $ 1.76 -5.1% Diluted earnings per share 1.65 1.74 -5.2% Dividends paid 0.88 0.84 4.8% Book value 13.50 15.40 -12.3% RATIOS Net income to net sales 4.4% 5.0% Return on average stockholders’ equity 11.4% 12.0% Return on average total capital 8.1% 8.6% Total debt to total capital 32.0% 32.9% ADDITIONAL INFORMATION Capital expenditures $ 120,513 $ 178,852 -32.6% Stock price/earnings ratio range 13-18x 15-21x Weighted-average common shares outstanding for computation of diluted earnings per share 100,969,449 104,114,043 Common shares outstanding at year-end 99,708,191 100,518,355 Number of employees 15,394 15,678 -1.8% 1 2008 Bemis Annual Report Henry J. Theisen Jeffrey H. Curler President & Chief Executive Officer Executive Chairman & Chairman of the Board To Our Fellow Shareholders 2 2008 Bemis Annual Report Bemis customers continuously seek out new growth opportunities by emphasizing new products and addressing the sustainability needs of their retail customers. Through innovation and technological expertise, we develop unique solutions that meet the complex needs of our customers. Despite a year of extraordinary challenges, we continue to be negative implications of this difficult environment. Our pleased with both the strength and the resiliency of our packaging is used throughout the grocery store, for everything business. In 2008, we strengthened our balance sheet, from national brands to store brands, from convenience- expanded our successful World Class Manufacturing initiative, oriented to value-priced products. With such a wide spectrum created innovative sustainable packaging options to meet our of products and broadly diversified customer base, our food customers’ needs, and completed a new converting plant in packaging markets offer a solid, long-term growth base for Suzhou, China. Thanks to our disciplined business strategy, our the majority of our business. Our medical device and sustained emphasis on new product development, and our pharmaceutical packaging business enjoys favorable constant focus on manufacturing efficiency and customer demographics and market growth. Combined, these markets service, we are confident that Bemis will remain strong and represent over sixty percent of our net sales. Conversely, our competitive, even in today’s unfavorable financial climate. pressure sensitive materials business has been experiencing the negative effects of the global economic downturn, as have During 2008, we faced a particularly challenging market. Raw some of our industrial packaging product lines. We are material and energy costs escalated at a rapid pace during the responding to these trends with aggressive cost management year. The result was a reduction of 5.2 percent in our diluted measures and customer initiatives designed to improve earnings per share for the year ended December 31, 2008. Our sales mix. outlook for 2009 is also cautious given our expectation of continued global economic weakness. In light of this economic Disciplined Business Strategy forecast, it is important to recognize the distinct advantages Our business model was designed to accommodate changes of our business. in raw material costs by periodically adjusting selling prices to reflect current market conditions. While the magnitude and Bemis’ involvement in stable markets—such as packaging for volatility of these cost changes impact the effectiveness of our food and consumer staples—successfully offsets some of the policy in the short term, we generally begin to recover our 3 2008 Bemis Annual Report original margin levels within a few months. This disciplined manufacturing model has been expanded to include our approach to pricing has been an effective business tool, quickly operations in Europe, Mexico, and parts of the United States. neutralizing the impact of raw material cost volatility on our Using a team approach that incorporates the insights of all operating results and cash flows. employees, our World Class Manufacturing initiative promotes a culture of smart business, efficient production, and customer Technology and Innovation focus. This initiative has been integral to our efforts to improve Consistent emphasis on customer growth initiatives and new the flexibility of our production facilities and includes product development is another integral facet of our business realignment of production resources, quantitative measurement model. Bemis customers continuously seek out new growth and reduction of waste, maximized machinery efficiency, and opportunities by emphasizing new products and addressing improved production scheduling. the sustainability needs of their retail customers. Through innovation and technological expertise, we develop unique Safety solutions that meet the complex needs of our customers. In Our most valuable resource is the technical skill and talent of many situations, creating sustainable packaging means our employees. To protect this important asset, we prioritize providing improved product shelf life and freshness while safety at all Bemis locations around the world. During 2008, utilizing less packaging material. When combined with large- we recognized five manufacturing locations for maintaining scale distribution systems, these are demanding performance particularly high safety standards with the first annual CEO metrics, necessitating extensive knowledge in polymer Safety Award. It is the goal of each of our locations to achieve chemistry, food science, and engineering. By delivering p roducts and maintain safety standards that consistently fall in the top that meet these high standards, Bemis consistently improves quartile of industry safety statistics. growth prospects for our customers. Strong Balance Sheet Customer Focus We used our cash flow provided by operations in 2008 to In 2008, we focused more engineering talent on established strengthen our balance sheet and reduce debt outstanding. products, allowing us to improve our manufacturing efficiency Prudent management of cash and working capital in 2009 is and customer service model across our most competitive an ongoing priority for our business teams. Our modern facilities product lines. During this period of dramatically increasing raw and patented and proprietary products provide us with a material costs, this strategy played a critical role in competitive advantage in the market and underscore the maintaining our competitive position and helped stabilize resilience of our long-term business model. volume trends in certain price-sensitive product lines. Asian Expansion World Class Manufacturing We are carefully investing in new capital where appropriate, Our World Class Manufacturing initiative delivered value across and we are pleased to announce the completion of a a broader range of business in 2008. Originally implemented converting plant in Suzhou, China during 2008. This plant will by our South American operations, this successful initially serve our nearby medical device customers, and it 4 2008 Bemis Annual Report