CHICAGO (June 4, 6:40 p.m. EDT) — A study three years ago showed the U.S. plastics industry to be slow in adopting the Internet and in exploiting the fledgling medium´s huge potential benefits. The results of a follow-up study — to be disclosed at a June 21 NPE news conference — will reveal how far the plastics industry has come in that regard.
Chicago-based DePaul University again is conducting the study, which was sponsored by USA Chicago Inc., a marketing and communications agency; Honeywell Inc., a Morristown, N.J., nylon resin supplier; the Society of the Plastics Industry Inc., a Washington-based trade association; and Plastics News of Akron, Ohio. The results will be presented in a one-hour news conference starting at 11:00 a.m. in Room E260 at McCormick Place.
The study will show how far the plastics industry has progressed since spring 1997 in adopting Internet technologies; how the Web is affecting the lines of communication among customers, distributors and manufacturers; and how the roles of each may change when it comes to information distribution.
The 10- to 12-page survey was mailed in mid-April to 10,000 U.S. plastics industry officials, including 7,000 to processor companies, and 1,000 each to resin supplier, equipment supplier and original-equipment-manufacturing end-user companies. All survey recipient names were drawn from Plastics News´ subscriber list.
For more information on the survey, contact Chris Dowd at USA Chicago, tel. (312) 444-9570, ext. 15, e-mail [email protected]