Do you want higher recycled content?  Do you want to brag about using bio-based raw materials for your PET and olefins?  There are currently available solutions - with many more coming soon.  But who will pay for the premium benefits these new polymers command?  At this point, the premium is too steep for use beyond a few ‘beauty samples’ in a remote test market. So will the premium-priced solutions not have a place until mandated into existence by legislation written by bureaucrats who have little understanding of manufacturing and costs? Will NGOs pressure these low-carbon alternatives into the market - as long as THEY do not have to pay for them?  (Did you ever wonder how vocal the NGOs would be if their demands had to be financed by their generous green investors?) 

Plastipak has been faced with this dilemma off and on since the early 1980’s. So these new ‘options’ are not the first to come along and disrupt a well-oiled (pun intended) premium container manufacturing operation. It is just that the stakes are now higher, the demands stronger, and the options more complex.  Define the goal, and solutions are available.  Keep changing the goal, and investments and frustrations soar.

Who is calling the shots?  Brands, NGO’s, lawmakers?  Define your specifications and your goals and we will get you there.  Just be willing to pay to play.