This week I read in a fantastic article that one of our SPI members (Bob Janeczko, CEO of Innovative Injection Technologies) and his wife donated more than $1 million for plastics engineering scholarships at the University of Wisconsin-Stout (UW-Stout).  The couple noted that the donation is their way of providing long-term support for UW-Stout and strengthening a growing career field. After seeing the article and reflecting on my own niece, who just left this week for college, I began to wonder “are college students today thinking of plastics as a career?”

Although the plastics industry is the third largest manufacturing sector in the U.S., when talking with students, “plastics” doesn’t seem to be the top career choice for most of them.  Even as someone with a plastics engineering background, I recognize that many of us in the industry fell into plastics versus making a conscious decision to go to school specifically in this area.

Students need to know that in the U.S. there are a number of schools with strong plastics programs, including University of Massachusetts – Lowell, the Pennsylvania College of Technology, Pittsburg State University and the University of Akron, among others.  We also need to let students know that great plastics industry jobs are out there.  In fact, according to information provided by Ferris State (another school with a strong plastics program), “our plastics program has consistently had 100% placement at excellent annual salaries.”  We know in talking with SPI member companies that they are hungry to find more students with a plastics education.

As an industry we are working to help get the word out. The Plastics Ambassador Program was launched last year to educate and mobilize individuals within the plastics industry to discuss the benefits of plastics in their local communities.  SPI is conducting a pilot of the initiative, training employees and encouraging them to promote plastics through community events such as PTA meetings, city council meetings or by sponsoring a PlastiVan™ school visit. The PlastiVan™ program travels to schools and companies throughout North America, educating people of all ages about plastic’s chemistry, history, processing, manufacturing, sustainability and application.

This opportunity is a great way also to reach out to students, to let them know about the opportunities in the plastics industry and to cheer about why plastics is a great career.  Future graduates – we welcome you with open arms.

President Obama mentioned SPI member company MGS Mfg. Group (Germantown, Wis.) in a speech given on August 16th after he toured the facilities of ZBB Energy Corporation, an MGS customer also based in Wisconsin. Obama shook hands with MGS Mfg. Group CEO Mark Sellers and used both companies as an example as he urged support for  U.S. manufacturing:

“Because of the steps we’ve taken to strengthen the economy, ZBB received a loan that’s helping to fund an expansion of your operations. Already, it’s allowed ZBB to retain nearly a dozen workers. And over time, the company expects to hire about 80 new workers. This is leading to new business for your suppliers, including MGS Plastics and other manufacturer here in Wisconsin.”

ZBB makes batteries used to store electricity from solar cells and wind turbines.  MGS Mfg. Group, an injection molder and moldmaker, provides complete development services to ZBB, including part and product design, tooling, molding, and other manufacturing solutions.

Yesterday I went to the White House to celebrate a hard-earned victory for job creation and the competitive hopes of American plastics manufacturers. I  felt a real sense of pride and progress as I sat in the East Room and watched President Barack Obama formally sign the Manufacturing Enhancement Act of 2010 into law.

I was honored to be at the signing ceremony because SPI’s advocacy team, aided by our dedicated members, worked tirelessly for more than two years to strongly encourage Congress to pass the Miscellaneous Tariff Bill (H.R. 4380). The legislation renews a number of expired tariff measures and reduces duties on manufacturing materials (including several essential to the plastics industry) that are not produced domestically, thus lowering costs for U.S. manufacturers. The bill, now formally named the Manufacturing Enhancement Act of 2010, was approved by both the U.S. House and Senate in late July.

While this one law won’t sweep away all of the challenges our industry currently faces, it marks real progress toward leveling the playing field for U.S. plastics manufacturers competing in the global marketplace. It will cut the cost of doing business for SPI members and the entire U.S. plastics industry. Free from the burden of tariffs on manufacturing inputs not produced  in the U.S., plastics companies will find it less challenging to maintain or increase their current workforce, spur investments and eventually help turn the tide in the nation’s economic recovery.

Signing ceremonies like this are the end result of a long advocacy process that involves being engaged with Congress from the start and making sure our industry’s collective voice is heard.  On September 15th our industry will have another opportunity to engage with Congress and have our voices heard — in face-to-face meetings on Capitol Hill.

On September 15th SPI members from across the country will gather in Washington, D.C. for an organized day of meetings with their elected representatives that will be followed by a reception. By taking the time to visit with lawmakers, we have an opportunity to educate them about the key policy issues that are challenging our companies – from energy to TSCA to R&D Tax Credits to a host of international trade concerns and more. Having just returned from their summer recess, legislators will be busy moving on these issues before the rapidly-approaching mid-term elections.

September 15th will be an excellent time for our industry to tell our story, remind Congress that the third largest manufacturing sector is critical to revitalizing the nation’s economy, and plant seeds so that we can celebrate more legislative victories (and signing ceremonies!) in the future.

What is a “processor” in the plastics industry?  According to the eligibility criteria for the Plastics News Processor of the Year Award, which SPI will be co-sponsoring this year, “a processor is a manufacturer that forms finished plastic parts, like a detergent bottle or car bumper fascia.” One European economic development firm describes a plastics processor as a company that “transforms plastic material to obtain a wide range of objects such as toys, bottles, packaging, floor coverings or car parts.” Some of the many processes that plastics processors use in the plastics industry include injection molding, blow molding, extrusion and thermoforming.

SPI’s first-ever Plastics Processors Conference will be held in Irving, Texas, November 16-18, 2010. Now, SPI has hosted conferences for individual types of processors before — such as those that make film and bags, for example, or food, drug and cosmetic packaging, or those that are thermoformers. But this November’s First Annual Plastics Processors Conference in Texas will be a gathering of the tribes of sorts — the first time SPI will bring all processors together to network, share strategies and soak up a groundbreaking program presented by leading plastics experts.

Featuring both business and technical sessions — as well as committee meetings for SPI Processors Council groups —  the conference is open to SPI members and nonmembers and will cover topics such as mergers and acquisitions in the processing industry, resin trends and forecasting, navigating multi-generational workplaces, regulatory compliance and customer assurance, FDA 101, the global future trends of bioplastics and nanotechnology and more.

Keynote speaker Peter Leyden, a future trends expert, will explain how to best utilize emerging technologies to enhance manufacturing productivity and strengthen corporate communications in an age of global transformation.

While plastics processors differ in the vast array of products they manufacture and end-markets they serve, they also share a lot in common — from quality control, environmental performance and regulatory compliance to financial performance, worker training, customer relations and keeping up with technological innovations. Processors have a lot on their plate and need to continually keep up with the latest information and best practices. No doubt, representatives of  these companies will want to find their way to Irving, Texas in November for SPI’s first-ever Processors Conference.

Online conference registration is now open! Both SPI members and nonmembers are encouraged to attend.

How do you move forward, improve and grow while simultaneously defending against unfounded efforts by others to impede those very advancements? That was the nature of the presentations on the second day of SPI’s Flexible Vinyl Products 21st Compounding Conference, as they alternated between  discussions of cutting-edge research, the latest market information and new tools to improve products on one hand, and strategies to negotiate product de-selection initiatives on the other.

Bill Hall, who chairs the environmental law practice at Winston & Strawn, presented a range of measures to employ in order to discourage product de-selection, and reminded attendees of the famous phrase of his former basketball coach, the late great Jim Valvano: “Don’t give up, don’t ever give up.” Hall played basketball under Valvano at Bucknell Univesrsity, prior to Valvano winning the NCAA national championship as the coach of North Carolina State University in a highly memorable last-second upset victory in 1983.

Later in the day, members of the ACC Phthalate Ester Panel exposed several anti-phthalate studies and news reports as myths using a glaring spotlight of reality in the form of government  statistics and common sense conclusions drawn by a variety of independent experts. The panel members also provided a regulatory and legislative update as well as a report on recent media trends.

Bill Carroll spoke to attendees about a few things, including his work as a member of California’s Green Chemistry Initiative Science Advisory Panel. The Green Chemistry program is a highly complex, some might say “convoluted,” process to remove or reduce chemicals deemed hazardous from products sold in California. Carroll, vice president, industry issues for Occidental Chemical Corporation, an an adjunct professor of chemistry at Indiana University, also engaged conference attendees in a discussion about the future of the flexible vinyl industry, asking, “Where will we be in 10 years? Where do we go from here?” The ensuing conversation swung from the need for greater innovation, to the need to be less risk-averse when it comes to investing  financial resources in compelling opportunities, and the possibility of the federal government setting policies that make the United States a friendlier place to do manufacturuing business.

But in addition to sessions on how to deal with negative external challenges, attendees also heard from speakers who brought expertise to the table that would help them do their jobs better and improve their vinyl products. Jim Roberts of BYK-Gardner, for example, spoke about how to best measure color, gloss (the amount of light reflected off a surface), haze, clarity and other physical properties of vinyl and its products. This is particularly important in today’s manufacturing world where one part of a product may be made in the United States as others are being made at other plants around the world. When they come together, they need to be exactly alike. Luckily, as I learned, there are lab and production line tools like the “Micro-Gloss” and “Spectro-Guide.”

Toward the end of the day, industry lion and Lord of the Rings enthusiast Dean Finney, retired from Eastman Chemical Company and now almost set to retire from Rivendell Consultants, paraphrased the Tolkien character Aragorn in addressing his embattled flexible vinyl colleagues: “Success does not belong to one man but to all. Let us together rebuild this world that we may share in the days of peace.”