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In September, my wife and I did a half Ironman relay. While waiting for my wife to finish the swimming portion, I struck up a conversation with a cyclist who was with team Rockit™ Apple. Inevitably, the conversation eventually turned to packaging.

Meeting face-to-face with packaging leaders and innovators at PACK EXPO Las Vegas provided valuable context and nuance that official news releases don’t offer.

Nine months into 2023, there is still a lot of work to do as far as reducing consumer confusion surrounding eco-friendly packaging – and reducing unnecessary packaging “waste” going to landfills.

Automation plays a huge and ever-growing role in the packaging industry. No surprise, then, that the July issue of Packaging Strategies featured a story on automation and controls (From Smart Valves to Smart Factories).

My early career as a journalist — over a span of roughly six years — involved reporting for metropolitan weekly and daily newspapers. However, I have spent a much larger portion of my career in the B2B arena, and I cut my B2B teeth reporting on — ta-dah!! — the fresh produce industry. Hence, I can’t help but get excited when I get to write about packaging as it relates to fresh produce.

The country famous for samba, Carnaval and world-class soccer also has an extremely impressive recycling rate for aluminum cans of approximately 99%. That’s higher than the estimated recycling rates for South America as a whole (92%), Europe (76%) and North America (55%).

Entering its 16th year, Converters Expo is once again bringing converters of paper, film, plastics, and nonwovens together with industry buyers, specialists and suppliers in what is sure to be one of the biggest industry events of the year. 

Just as baseball fans can look forward to World Series rematches, German trade group VDMA says the packaging machinery industry has a lot to look forward to in 2023.

From the sustainability movement to packaging design trends, a CPG veteran and two of his colleagues offer their predictions.

Just as intriguing as the statistics behind KU’s and Gonzaga’s storied basketball successes are the statistics behind foodservice carry-out, which is the focus of one of this month’s feature stories as it relates to packaging.