Reynolds closing Chester Plastics unit
CHESTER, NOVA SCOTIA - Packaging thermoformer Chester Plastics Ltd. will shut its doors this summer as its parent company, Reynolds Food Packaging Canada, aims to cut costs.
Reynolds plans to close the Chester plant June 30. About 50 people are employed at the facility, established by local businessman George Nemeskeri in 1968. He sold the business in 2001 to Ivex Packaging Corp. and founded thermoforming equipment supplier GN Plastics Co. Ltd., also in Chester. Reynolds obtained the thermoforming operation in 2002 when parent Alcoa Inc. bought Ivex.
Reynolds said in a Feb. 24 news release that it will move Chester's machinery and production to a Reynolds thermoforming plant in Summerstown, Ontario. The Chester customer service center will move near Halifax to support Reynolds' Atlantic Canada packaging customers.
Reynolds spokesman John Babiak said in an interview that the company's other Canadian thermoforming plants are in Laval, Quebec, and Calgary, Alberta.
Ipex chairman Torokvei dies at age 61
DON MILLS, ONTARIO - Ipex Inc. Chairman Tom Torokvei died of a heart attack Feb. 24 while on vacation with his family in the Bahamas. He was 61.
Torokvei served with the Don Mills-based pipe extruder for more than 38 years, officials said.
``He was a gentleman with unimpeachable integrity,'' said Ipex President Paul Graddon in a March 1 telephone interview. ``He was a visionary, very well-respected in the industry and well-respected in our company.
``He had a vision of growth and delivered on that all the years that I have known him.''
Torokvei's father, Evald Torokvei, founded Scepter Manufacturing Co. Ltd., which merged its pipe extrusion operations with those of Canron Inc. in 1991 to form Ipex.
The funeral was March 3 in Toronto. Torokvei is survived by his wife, Cynthia, and two children.
Bank seeking buyer for publisher Canon
NEW YORK - Media merchant bank Veronis Suhler Stevenson of New York is looking for a buyer for publisher which is based in Los Angeles.
Canon owns 14 magazines, including Injection Molding Magazine, Plastics Machinery & Auxiliaries and Modern Plastics. It also owns 15 trade shows, including Plastec East and West, Medical Design & Manufacturing, OEM New England and Atlantic Design & Manufacturing.
Veronis Suhler Stevenson officials, reached by telephone March 3, would not comment.
According to a March 2 report on the Daily Deal financial news Web site, Canon is expected to sell for $200 million to $250 million.
Web site encourages political interest
ARLINGTON, VA. - The American Plastics Council is launching a Web site to try to get plastics company employees more involved in the political process.
The site, www.impactplastics.org, is being done in conjunction with a similar American Chemistry Council site, www.impact chemistry.com, and urges employees to write letters to public officials about issues their employers consider important, said ACC spokesman Glenn Ruskin. Arlington-based APC is part of ACC.
The top issue on both sites is the price of natural gas, which ACC said is the highest in the world and has contributed to the loss of $50 billion in chemical industry business to overseas competition and the loss of 90,000 jobs.
The site also will be used to launch state efforts, such as one to build support for mold-lien legislation in Illinois, Ruskin said.
The sites require registration, and officials from the trade groups said the sites will help build a list of politically aware employees.
``We're building a formidable database of active people in the business of chemistry and plastics - shop-floor employees, small-business owners, sales people, fabricators - so they can easily communicate with public-policy makers,'' ACC President and Chief Executive Officer Tom Reilly said in a news release.
