“Hey, Kayla?” says Levon into the phone.  “I’m sorry to do this again, but I have to stay late at the plant. I won’t be home for another couple of hours.” In the reflected glare of the overhead fluorescent lights, the break room stands in harsh relief. In the corner sits the aging refrigerator, the […]

After a recent trip to the store, which yielded plastic bags filled with plastic packages—containing plastic toys, lights, and dinnerware—I’ve become fairly convinced that plastics are taking over the world. Polymer is the material of the future. The Packaging Science University of Florida explains the reason for this market trend best, stating that “improvements in polymer performance […]

This week, I received a call from a manufacturing client who was struggling with a lack of customer satisfaction for one of their artist-quality acrylic paints. Apparently, the color on the bottles didn’t accurately reflect what the dried paint looked like by daylight, and the customers were demanding more precise labeling. The problem, of course, is that this is […]

The automotive industry is booming. Light vehicle production is on the rise as new features start to push the boundaries of design. Statistics show that “plastics and polymer composites [are] essential to a wide range of safety and performance breakthroughs in today’s cars, minivans, pickups and SUVs.  In fact, the use of plastic and polymer composites in light […]