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Greif makes the industrial packaging the chemicals, food, agriculture and pharma world ships its liquids and powders in — steel and plastic drums, intermediate bulk containers (IBCs), jerricans, fibre drums and reconditioned containers. Founded in 1877, it is deliberately unglamorous plumbing of the physical economy. In 2025 it reshaped itself into a focused packaging pure-play: it sold its containerboard business to Packaging Corporation of America for $1.8B and its timberlands to Molpus for $462M, paid down ~$1.5B of debt, and reorganised around four material-solution segments (polymer, metal, fiber, integrated).

The container the economy ships in

Greif sits at the 'finished materials' step of the materials chain. Steelmakers and resin producers feed it metal and plastic; recovered fiber feeds its board mills. Greif turns those into drums, IBCs and jerricans, then the chemical, food, ag, pharma and petroleum industries fill them. A reconditioning loop gives many containers a second life.

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