Guest: Rebecca Marquez, Director of Custom Research, PMMI

PMMI's Director of Custom Research Rebecca Marquez returns to the unPACKed microphone to discuss the findings from her comprehensive collaboration with AMERIPEN: “2023 Packaging Compass: Evaluating Trends in U.S. Packaging Design Over the Next Decade and Implications for the Future of a Circular Packaging System.” In Part One of this Chat, Rebecca takes us through the most important findings from the report. Be on the lookout for Part Two, offering a perspective on how legislation down the road might impact OEMs and CPGs.

Guests: Matt Reynolds, Editor, Packaging World and Anne Marie Mohan, Senior Editor, Packaging World

The future is now in part six of unPaCKed’s six-part sustainability sit-down with Packaging World editors Anne Marie Mohan and Matt Reynolds. Bioplastics reads like an oxymoron, but the revolutionary new materials from renewable resources versus petroleum are indeed here to stay. Mohan and Reynolds cover sustainability and packaging materials daily and examine how sugar cane, corn, and even wood chips now find their way into packaging materials in lieu of traditional plastics.

Explore sustainable solutions at PACK EXPO Las Vegas this September 11-13. Registration is now open!

Guests: Matt Reynolds, Editor, Packaging World and Anne Marie Mohan, Senior Editor, Packaging World

Packaging World editors Anne Marie Mohan and Matt Reynolds return to unPACKed for the fifth episode of its six-part sustainability sit-down, turning the spotlight on monolayer materials. All plastics and foils are not created equal, and the complexity that allows them to protect food or beverages, for instance, also makes recycling significantly harder. Mohan and Reynolds cover sustainability and packaging materials daily and discuss how monolayer materials could be one of the major keys to a more sustainable packaging supply chain.

Guests: Matt Reynolds, Editor, Packaging World and Anne Marie Mohan, Senior Editor, Packaging World

Part four of unPACKed’s six-part sustainability sit down with Packaging World editors Anne Marie Mohan and Matt Reynolds takes us to the world of reuse and refill. Reuse and refill is more than just the ubiquitous beverage containers everyone carries around to do their sustainability part. Mohan and Reynolds cover sustainability and packaging materials daily for Packaging World and discuss how reuse and refill is making inroads in various markets, including health and beauty, cleaning supplies, and food and beverage.

Guests: Matt Reynolds, Editor, Packaging World and Anne Marie Mohan, Senior Editor, Packaging World

As one of the oldest, if not the oldest, packaging materials, paper was also one of the earliest package types to be recycled and is the topic for part three of a six-part sustainability sit-down with Packaging World editors Anne Marie Mohan and Matt Reynolds. Mohan and Reynolds cover sustainability and packaging materials daily for Packaging World. The pair discuss how paper’s relative ease to recycle created growth in its use in place of plastic films and even bottles. Plus, we get to the bottom of exactly what to do with pizza boxes when it comes to recycling.

Guests: Matt Reynolds, Editor, Packaging World and Anne Marie Mohan, Senior Editor, Packaging World

Aluminum is the topic for part two of a six-part sustainability sit-down with Packaging World editors Anne Marie Mohan and Matt Reynolds. Mohan and Reynolds cover sustainability and packaging materials daily for Packaging World and rank among the most knowledgeable in the industry on current trends and breakthroughs. The pair discuss how aluminum could be infinitely recyclable and why the general public embraces—or at least appears to embrace— aluminum recycling more than other materials.

Guests: Matt Reynolds, Editor, Packaging World and Anne Marie Mohan, Senior Editor, Packaging World

Advanced recycling kicks off part one of a six-part sustainability sit down with Packaging World editors Anne Marie Mohan and Matt Reynolds. Mohan and Reynolds cover sustainability and packaging materials daily for Packaging World and rank among the most knowledgeable in the packaging and processing industry on current trends and breakthroughs. In this episode, the pair discuss how advanced recycling could be the next step in ensuring packaging sustainability, as it focuses on breaking down difficult-to-recycle materials to a molecular level before reuse.

Guest: Pat Finlay, R&D Sr. Director, Global Beverages Packaging at PepsiCo

For our 100th episode, unPACKed spoke about workforce initiatives with Pat Finlay, who serves as R&D Sr. Director of Global Beverages Packaging for one of the world's largest and most recognizable brands: PepsiCo. We couldn’t let a guest from a high-profile company like that leave without prodding him on PepsiCo’s current sustainability initiatives. Large companies will ultimately drive real change, so let’s hear what the biggest food and beverage company in the U.S. is currently working on regarding sustainability. 

Guests: Kyla Fisher, AMERIPEN and Rebecca Marquez, Director of Custom Research, PMMI

One of the main drivers for AMERIPEN and PMMI’s upcoming 10 Year Packaging Material Compass is trying to understand packaging and packaging recovery, as the recycling community clamors to better understand and adapt to the future of packaging. AMERIPEN’s Kyla Fisher and PMMI’s Rebecca Marquez join the unPACKed with PMMI pod to explain the need for this tool to see into the future about potential legislation, what consumers and CPGs are going to be looking for in sustainable packaging and what changes OEMs will need to make to adapt to this new reality. It’s sure to be a terrific report and this is just a taste of some of the early findings from the 10 year Packaging Material Compass.

Guest: Keren Sookne, director of Editorial Content, Healthcare Packaging

Keren Sookne, director of Editorial Content for Healthcare Packaging and PMMI’s in-house healthcare packaging expert, joins the podcast as we wrestle with how the variety of complex containers that ultimately end up as life sciences packaging can become more sustainable. She discusses the inroads healthcare packaging has already made with sustainability, the repurposing of some forms of life sciences waste and where the industry still needs to catch up with traditional CPG-based packagers. 

View the Emerging EU Sustainability Regulations for Packaging