SPC Engage 2019: Minneapolis

We will be serving breakfast and refreshments in the Regency Room to start off the day.

The first part of SPC Engage will set the scene on the theme of the conference – corporate goals, specifically sustainable packaging goals, including a discussion on why companies are setting them, the types of goals companies are setting, and related existing voluntary and legislative frameworks such as the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), New Plastics Economy, and others. The session will also discuss best practices for goal setting and provide an introduction of key goal categories from the SPC’s Goals Database.

These include goals around:

•      Using Bio-based/Renewable Materials
•      Eliminating Unfavorable Materials
•      Improving Recovery Infrastructure
•      Increasing Recycling
•      Improving Material Efficiency
•      Enhancing Recyclability
•      Using and Increasing Recycled Content
•      Undertaking Responsible Fiber Sourcing
•      Improving Volumetric Efficiency

In this session we will define criteria for responsibly sourced, renewable materials, including a discussion of ‘good’ sourcing choices. We will also define criteria for sourcing recycled materials and ‘good’ packaging design choices to enable the use of recycled content.

Learn from key stakeholders on how they identified their sourcing goals; how did they get buy-in from internal and external partners and how did they execute their plan.

As a continuation of the Sourcing Deep Dive, participants will break out into smaller groups where they will engage each other in dialog on the topics they heard about in the overview and panel session on sourcing.  This will be an opportunity to digest this material and ask additional questions. Tables will focus on specific topics within the sourcing umbrella and participants will have a choice on which table they go to. Panelists and SPC staff will serve as table leaders to help guide the conversations.

In this session we will define criteria for recyclable, reusable and compostable packaging and how this translates to packaging design and sustainability commitments around recovery. We will also discuss nuances related to ‘design for recovery’ in the context of global recovery infrastructure, provide examples of ‘good’ packaging design choices, and discuss sustainability tradeoffs.

Reusable, recyclable or compostable: learn how these packaging decisions affect your design, your material selection and ultimately how your package will be recovered. Hear from leading brands about how they selected their end of life package strategy; what considerations played a role; the tradeoffs they found along the way and what advice they have for companies making these decisions.

As a continuation of the Recovery Deep Dive, participants will break out into smaller groups where they will engage each other in dialog on the topics they heard about in the overview and panel session on recovery.  This will be an opportunity to digest this material and ask additional questions. Tables will focus on specific topics within the recovery umbrella and participants will have a choice on which table they go to. Panelists and SPC staff will serve as table leaders to help guide the conversations.

Be prepared to roll-up your sleeves and dive into a facilitated, focused dialog in a hands-on workshop. In this session, event participants will choose one specific goal to explore further, drawing from SPC’s Value Innovation Process that will include troubleshooting issues and creating action maps for implementing goals.