Rethinking the potential of plastic

In four weeks, the Smart Plastic team will be headed to PACK EXPO International 2022!

Last year's event was truly remarkable - we had the opportunity to meet industry leaders from across the United States and beyond. Our entire team is looking forward to this opportunity again.

We will be at Booth #W-23046 in the Containers and Materials Pavillion (West Building) all week.

This year our team is ready to chat all things sustainability, including how our revolutionary ECLIPSE™ Stretch Film and Co-Ex films are making a serious impact on the polymer industry.

PACK EXPO International is the largest packaging and processing trade show in the world. With over 2,000 exhibitors and >40,000 attendees, there will be no shortage of networking and engaging with the industry's best!

Learn more about this year’s event by visiting https://www.packexpointernational.com/

Jim joined Smart Plastic Technologies after spending a few decades using his graphic arts skills in the print and packaging industries. As our Product Sales Specialist, Jim brings these decades of print experience to the team and has extensive knowledge in converting and plastic materials.

Jim uses his previous plastic materials and packaging experience to bring new ideas and solutions to the table at Smart Plastic HQ. His current professional goals include growing commercial sales for SPTek additives and products while increasing our customer’s knowledge of SPTek technology. Educating our customers is an integral part of Jim’s job; He wants to ensure customers have extensive knowledge of the technology and the SPTek solutions available to communicate with their clients confidently.

Starting his career in sheetfed printing, Jim has moved through various levels of leadership positions. A few roles include procurement, sourcing, operations management, and sales management. At one time, he was an estimating instructor for the Print Industry of Illinois too. Jim has become passionate about polymer sustainability after working in the industry, in various roles, for years. Jim is an experienced group fitness instructor, cyclist, and two-time Chicago Marathon finisher with a love for German Shepherds, music, and Jeeps.

We believe in the power and capability future generations have in creating a better world for everyone, and we are thrilled to help foster those individuals’ passions and experiences through our internship program. Let’s introduce one of our interns right now!

Chelsea Ganzman will be a senior at Temple University this fall where she is studying Environmental Studies, Political Science, and Geographic Information Systems (GIS). With a strong passion and interest in environmental studies, Chelsea is hoping to start her career in corporate sustainability or CSR.

This summer Chelsea is our Project Support Intern. She will be working on various projects including conducting fundamental research, collaborating on project management tasks, and ensuring daily tasks with Smart Plastic employees are completed.

“I have been looking forward to this summer internship for months, and I am so happy that it is finally time to work for such a great company whose impacts are large and significant in the environmental and economic realm. I am most excited to learn more about the plastics-related field, specifically, the technology and additives used, as well as how SPT's plastics are such a sustainable alternative and the way of the future. The company's goals and accomplishments have motivated me to not only learn more about the plastics' related sector but to learn how I can be of significance and importance to this company and how we can learn from each other.”

We are thrilled to have Chelsea on board as an integral member of our team!

We pride ourselves on developing products that have all the beneficial properties of plastic without the added environmental damage. It’s essential that our products live up to not only our own customers’ standards – but also to their customers’ standards as well.

We recently received the following testimonial from one of our customers and couldn't be more thrilled to hear it.

Highlight Industries:

“Highlight recently conducted comparative lab and load stability tests on two high-performance commercial stretch films, one made with Smart Plastic's SPTek ECLIPSE™ bio-assimilation technology and another without the additive. All tests performed yielded statistically equivalent results, with no noticeable difference in the excellent performance properties of the commercial film, with or without the ECLIPSE™ additive. These results are all the more impressive considering the ECLIPSE™ content will reportedly render the stretch film capable of complete bio-assimilation. This is a real win for green technology in the stretch film industry.”

We are thrilled to announce another new addition to the Smart Plastic team. Dan Pinsel joins us as our new Chief Financial Officer after over 20 years as a Senior Finance Executive. Dan’s core area of focus will be to deliver measurable and sustainable improvements in financial and business initiatives throughout the company while keeping business initiatives on track and within budget, among many other responsibilities!

Dan is ecstatic about joining the Smart Plastic team and looks forward to achieving many professional goals in 2022. Dan will lead the finance, accounting, and human resources functions for the company. He will work with the team to create enhanced processes and procedures which will create improved results. And finally, Dan will provide financial leadership in the areas of cash flow management, forecasting, expense analysis, and other areas to help drive overall performance.

Dan’s background in both public and private companies adds to his overall financial experience. He previously held CFO positions at Sysco Corporation and Blue Plate Catering. Prior to that, Dan was the VP of Finance at Food For Thought and Director of Finance at ARAMARK Corporation.

Dan has a track record of improving organizations’ financial performance through cross-functional collaboration and leadership. He is known for being a proactive problem-solver who delivers client value. Dan is a skilled leader who has mentored and developed high-performing teams. He lives in Lincolnshire, Illinois with his wife and 2 children. Dan has a strong interest in sustainability and helping chart a path for positive environmental change for the planet and its people.

As a true advocate for the health of our planet and its inhabitants, Tim has endeavored to build a strong leadership team that will take Smart Plastic to new heights. In 2022, Tim will establish and lead the Smart Foundation, which will sponsor scholarships to students pursuing an education in sustainability studies.

Since Smart Plastic’s founding, Tim has led the management team in developing a global market presence. Different from management, leadership cannot be taught, although it may be learned and enhanced through experience. Honed through the challenges of business throughout the decades, Tim has developed and demonstrated strong leadership skills. He manages under the belief of leading by example, rolling up his sleeves, and inspiring others to engage in achieving a goal.

In addition to his sustainability work, Tim is a strong supporter of child advocacy and has received numerous awards as both a child advocate and philanthropist. He established the Second Chance Foundation and Second Chance Ranch, a home for teenage boys who are victims of abuse and neglect. Tim and his wife, Leslie, adopted a child from the Foundation and currently reside in Knoxville together.

Tim's entrepreneurial experience spans more than 50 years, ranging from decades in real estate development, launching the first consumer VOIP network prepaid calling card company in the US, to founding Smart Plastic Technologies in 2016. A true visionary, analytical thinker, and problem solver who enjoys an international reputation as an ethical and reliable businessman, Tim will establish and lead the Smart Foundation, which will sponsor scholarships to students pursuing an education in sustainability studies.

In 2022, Tim will establish and lead the Smart Foundation, which will sponsor scholarships to students pursuing an education in sustainability studies.

At Smart Plastic our partnerships are a fundamental support mechanism for our business. We are thrilled to highlight a key technical partner that we have been working with since the beginning to create and irrevocably prove our ECLIPSE™ technology - LMPE, an eco-compatible polymeric materials laboratory based in Lucca, Italy.

Together with LMPE, Pisa University, CNR Laboratories, and other university bio-science labs, we designed and conducted the first-ever C-13 test to determine bio-assimilation in ECLIPSE™-enabled plastic. This bio-assimilation test conclusively tracks the origin of carbon within a closed environment using Carbon-13. In addition to our laboratory work, Dr. Lucia Perez, LMPE’s former Materials & Bio-Systems Engineer, is a member of our Science Advisory board, supporting the technical development of our products.

The methodology of the C-13 carbon labeling test is quite simple, it took degraded ECLIPSE™ material and fed it to a colony of microorganisms in order to prove bio-assimilation. To track the amount of carbon given off during the test and the growth of the colony, proving bio-assimilation, the researchers used carbon labeling with Carbon-13 atoms. The carbon labeling showed that the locked hydro-carbon chains in the plastic broke down to an open carbon source which the colony of microorganisms could use as a fuel source, breaking the material down completely with no microplastics left.

Wikipedia describes carbon labeling as such:

Carbon labeling is a form of isotopic labeling where a carbon-12 atom has been replaced with either a carbon-13 atom or a carbon-14 atom in a chemical compound so as to 'tag' that position of the compound to assist in determining the way a chemical reaction proceeds.

We began working with LMPE in 2016 to conclusively prove our revolutionary ECLIPSE™ technology. We are delighted that such a reputable laboratory is one of our technical partners and we look forward to working with LMPE as we continue to better plastic for the future of our planet and its inhabitants.

About LMPE

LMPE (Ecosustainable Polymeric Materials Laboratory) srl Benefit Company is an Italian Innovative Start-up and is an affiliated Spin-off to INSTM The National Inter-University Consortium of Materials Science and Technology. LMPE’s mission is aimed at the research & development of materials, processes, and technologies in the field of polymeric materials, and semi-finished and eco-friendly finished products.

Understanding the importance of the circular economy, LMPE is a member of the ICESP (Italian Circular Economy Stakeholder Platform). LMPE uses a set of modern equipment in collaboration with the INSTM Consortium and the Department of Chemistry and Industrial Chemistry of the Pisa University.

The following tests are completed at LMPE:

• Mechanical Test and Terminology (for characterization and quality control)
• Test for Degradation, Photo-oxidative Stability & Biodegradation (in water, soil and compost) ASTM
• Test for Degradation, Photo-oxidative Stability & Biodegradation (in water, soil and compost) ISO
• Test for Degradation, Photo-oxidative Stability & Biodegradation (in water, soil and compost)
• Toxicity test

A common belief is that aerosol containers (hairspray, spray deodorant, shaving cream, bug spray, spray paint, etc.) cannot be recycled. However, this is a false statement! Each municipality is different so make sure to check how you can properly recycle your aerosol cans instead of throwing them away.

For recycling content like this, check our our social media profiles below!

Smart Plastics Technologies is pleased to announce the addition of Bill Flynn as a new Sales Specialist. Bill shares the corporate mission and passion for environmental sustainability and is ready to work alongside the Smart Plastic team to transform how our world uses and discards plastic.

As a Sales Specialist, Bill will be focusing on generating commercial sales of ECLIPSE™ Stretch Film. For the remainder of 2022, Bill hopes to meet and surpass his own personal business goals, while intimately studying, and potentially selling, the complete line of SPTek polymer additives.

Bill’s previous experience includes the founding of his own Manufacturers Representative Agency with a concentration on flexible packaging where he engineered the building of a global buy/sell platform for PPE products. In keeping with his entrepreneurial spirit, Bill also founded a boutique consultancy firm that originated and placed debt and equity positions for startup companies and Joint Venture Partnerships.

Bill’s additional experience includes distribution sales in paper and commercial printing on a national and global level while creating a profitable and ongoing book of business with a major blue-chip distributor based out of NYC and New Jersey. Bill is centrally located in Chicago just outside the Smart Plastic corporate headquarters in Buffalo Grove, IL.

The days will be full of extraordinary learning and networking with other industry leaders. Make sure to visit our team at table 17A to learn how our technology could be your solution!

Check out the announcement on our social media profiles below!