Group O, headquartered in

Milan, Illinois Milan ( ) is a village in Rock Island County, Illinois, United States. The population was 5,097 at the time of the 2020 census; down from 5,099 at the 2010 census. The village is located adjacent to the Quad Cities of Illinois and Iowa. Histor ...

, is one of the largest

Hispanic The term Hispanic () are people, Spanish culture, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or broadly. In some contexts, Hispanic and Latino Americans, especially within the United States, "Hispanic" is used as an Ethnici ...

- owned companies in the U.S. and a provider of managed products and services.

History

Group O was founded in

in 1974 by Robert Ontiveros. Bob's initial business, Bi-State Packaging, was started to sell packaging materials and equipment to manufacturers. During the 1970s Bi-State Packaging experienced sales growth, requiring the opening of several warehouses throughout the United States, Mexico and Puerto Rico – making Group O an international business. In 1979, Group O opened R&O Specialties to provide

supply chain A supply chain is a complex logistics system that consists of facilities that convert raw materials into finished products and distribute them to end consumers or end customers, while supply chain management deals with the flow of goods in distri ...

solutions to industrial and consumer products companies. R&O Specialties brought a focus on process management and a

Six Sigma Six Sigma (6σ) is a set of techniques and tools for process improvement. It was introduced by American engineer Bill Smith while working at Motorola in 1986. Six Sigma strategies seek to improve manufacturing quality by identifying and removin ...

culture to Group O that permeates the entire company to this day. In 1990, Group O identified additional opportunities for growth in the area of

marketing Marketing is the act of acquiring, satisfying and retaining customers. It is one of the primary components of Business administration, business management and commerce. Marketing is usually conducted by the seller, typically a retailer or ma ...

support services and created Group O Direct. This venture took Group O into customer loyalty and marketing fulfillment programs which required Group O to develop competencies in the areas of:

data management Data management comprises all disciplines related to handling data as a valuable resource, it is the practice of managing an organization's data so it can be analyzed for decision making. Concept The concept of data management emerged alongsi ...

printing Printing is a process for mass reproducing text and images using a master form or template. The earliest non-paper products involving printing include cylinder seals and objects such as the Cyrus Cylinder and the Cylinders of Nabonidus. The ...

direct mail Advertising mail, also known as direct mail (by its senders), junk mail (by its recipients), mailshot or admail (North America), letterbox drop or letterboxing (Australia), is the delivery of advertising material to recipients of postal mail. Th ...

, promotional campaign management and business process outsourcing. In 2007, those three separate companies merged under Group O to become the three divisions – Packaging Solutions, Supply Chain Solutions and Marketing Solutions – that make up Group O. In 2008, Group O began offering print procurement and premium managed services to its clients. In 2013, Group O began to promote its Business Analytics offerings as a fourth vertical, aligned closely with its Marketing Solutions division. In 2012, CEO Gregg Ontiveros was recognized by the United States Hispanic Chamber of Commerce as the HBE Hispanic Businessman of the Year. In 2013, Chairman Robert Ontiveros was presented with the Order of Lincoln Award, recognized as the state of Illinois' highest honor. In 2013, Group O presented the first of five Hispanic MBA scholarships to a student attending

Notre Dame University The University of Notre Dame du Lac (known simply as Notre Dame; ; ND) is a private Catholic research university in Notre Dame, Indiana, United States. Founded in 1842 by members of the Congregation of Holy Cross, a Catholic religious order o ...

, partnering with the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. Group O has over 1,500 employees across 34 U.S. facilities and is recognized as one of the largest Hispanic-owned businesses in the U.S.

Products and Services

The company is specialized in

marketing services Marketing is the act of acquiring, satisfying and retaining customers. It is one of the primary components of business management and commerce. Marketing is usually conducted by the seller, typically a retailer or manufacturer. Products can ...

, print management,

business analytics Business analytics (BA) refers to the skills, technologies, and practices for iterative exploration and investigation of past business performance to gain insight and drive business planning. Business analytics focuses on developing new insights ...

decision sciences Decision theory or the theory of rational choice is a branch of probability theory, probability, economics, and analytic philosophy that uses expected utility and probabilities, probability to model how individuals would behave Rationality, ratio ...

, business process outsourcing,

managed services Managed services is the practice of outsourcing the responsibility for maintaining, and anticipating need for, a range of processes and functions, ostensibly for the purpose of improved operations and reduced budgetary expenditures through the ...

packaging Packaging is the science, art and technology of enclosing or protecting products for distribution, storage, sale, and use. Packaging also refers to the process of designing, evaluating, and producing packages. Packaging can be described as a coo ...

supply chain management In commerce, supply chain management (SCM) deals with a system of procurement (purchasing raw materials/components), operations management, logistics and marketing channels, through which raw materials can be developed into finished produc ...

and

third-party logistics Third-party logistics (abbreviated as 3PL, or TPL) is an organization's long-term commitment of outsourcing its distribution services to third-party logistics businesses. Third-party logistics providers typically specialize in integrated opera ...

. The company targets a broad range of industries, including:

food and beverage The foodservice (US English) or catering (British and Commonwealth English) industry includes the businesses, institutions, and companies which prepare meals outside the home. It includes restaurants, grocery stores, school and hospital cafeter ...

telecommunications Telecommunication, often used in its plural form or abbreviated as telecom, is the transmission of information over a distance using electronic means, typically through cables, radio waves, or other communication technologies. These means of ...

manufacturing Manufacturing is the creation or production of goods with the help of equipment, labor, machines, tools, and chemical or biological processing or formulation. It is the essence of the secondary sector of the economy. The term may refer ...

consumer packaged goods Fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG), also known as consumer packaged goods (CPG) or convenience goods, are products that are sold quickly and at a relatively low cost. Examples include non-durable household goods such as packaged foods, bevera ...

financial services Financial services are service (economics), economic services tied to finance provided by financial institutions. Financial services encompass a broad range of tertiary sector of the economy, service sector activities, especially as concerns finan ...

pharmaceutical Medication (also called medicament, medicine, pharmaceutical drug, medicinal product, medicinal drug or simply drug) is a drug used to diagnose, cure, treat, or prevent disease. Drug therapy ( pharmacotherapy) is an important part of the ...

health care Health care, or healthcare, is the improvement or maintenance of health via the preventive healthcare, prevention, diagnosis, therapy, treatment, wikt:amelioration, amelioration or cure of disease, illness, injury, and other disability, physic ...

retail Retail is the sale of goods and services to consumers, in contrast to wholesaling, which is the sale to business or institutional customers. A retailer purchases goods in large quantities from manufacturers, directly or through a wholes ...

and

technology Technology is the application of Conceptual model, conceptual knowledge to achieve practical goals, especially in a reproducible way. The word ''technology'' can also mean the products resulting from such efforts, including both tangible too ...

Clients

The company's major clients include

AT&T AT&T Inc., an abbreviation for its predecessor's former name, the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the w ...

Bristol-Myers Squibb The Bristol-Myers Squibb Company, doing business as Bristol Myers Squibb (BMS), is an American multinational pharmaceutical company. Headquartered in Princeton, New Jersey, BMS is one of the world's largest pharmaceutical companies and consist ...

Caterpillar Caterpillars ( ) are the larval stage of members of the order Lepidoptera (the insect order comprising butterflies and moths). As with most common names, the application of the word is arbitrary, since the larvae of sawflies (suborder ...

Frito-Lay Frito-Lay, Inc. (; ) is an American food company that manufactures, markets, and sells snack foods. It began in the early 1930s as two companies, Fritos, the Frito Company and Lay's, H.W. Lay & Company, that merged in 1961. Frito-Lay itself merg ...

Kraft Foods Kraft Foods Group, Inc. was an American food manufacturing and processing conglomerate (company), conglomerate, split from Kraft Foods Inc. on October 1, 2012, and was headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. It became part of Kraft Heinz on July ...

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company, technology conglomerate headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975, the company became influential in the History of personal computers#The ear ...

PepsiCo PepsiCo, Inc. is an American multinational corporation, multinational food, snack, and beverage corporation headquartered in Harrison, New York, in the hamlet of Purchase, New York, Purchase. PepsiCo's business encompasses all aspects of the f ...

, and Staples.

Company

Management

Current CEO is Kevin Kotecki. Robert Ontiveros is the founder and chairman of the company. Bob Marriott was named CFO.

Awards and Facts

*15th Largest Hispanic Owned Business, by revenue, in the United States *2011 National Minority Supplier of the Year (Greater than $50M US revenue) - National Minority Supplier Development CouncilNMSDC Honors Group O with 2009 Regional Supplier of the Year Award
Moline Dispatch and Rock Island Argus, November 9, 2009 *25 Largest Employers in the

Quad City The Quad Cities is a region of five cities (originally Tri-Cities, later four, see #History, History) in the U.S. states of Iowa and Illinois: Davenport, Iowa, Davenport and Bettendorf, Iowa, Bettendorf (the fifth to be included) in southeaster ...

Region (14th)Quad Cities First survey of Human Resources and Personnel Departments
May 13, 2008 *3rd Largest Company, by employees, headquartered in the

Region

References

External links

* {{Illinois Corporations Business services companies established in 1974 Companies based in Rock Island County, Illinois Companies based in the Quad Cities Packaging companies of the United States Logistics companies of the United States Business process outsourcing companies of the United States 1974 establishments in Illinois Transportation companies based in Illinois