Kickstart: Clearing the air at K

Messe Düsseldorf organizers want to make it clear that attendees at K 2022 this year in Germany will be able to breathe easy.

The host site for the world's biggest plastics trade show, set for Oct. 19-26, says it will have 3,000 HEPA filters installed by July. The filters are able to remove "99.9 percent of viruses, bacteria and other particulates from the air and release the cleaned air into the room again."

Halls 1, 9 and 17 plus Congress Center Düsseldorf CCD have already had the filters installed. The German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Protection provided 80 percent of the 1.4 million euros ($1.48 million) invested in the improvements.

"Our new HEPA filters help to ensure that we can offer all guests the greatest possible protection during our trade fairs," Wolfram N. Diener, president and CEO of Messe Düsseldorf, said in a news release. "After two pandemic years and a period of intense digital communication participants can feel safe when networking, initiating business deals and experiencing innovations in person again."

A U.S. retailer wants to help people with green thumbs become a little greener.

Grand Rapids, Mich.-based Meijer has extended its program for recycling of plastic flower pots and trays to products purchased from any store — not just its own garden centers.

It is an expansion to a recycling program that began in 2014 that so far has recycled 1,825 tons of plastic through East Jordan Plastics Inc., a South Haven, Mich.-based recycler.

"By working with our suppliers and customers to recycle those containers, it's our way of being more environmentally friendly and moving the industry forward," Jeff Lynch, garden center merchant for Meijer, said in a news release.

Meijer works with three main suppliers of annual flowers based near Grand Rapids: Masterpiece Flower Co., Kalamazoo Flower Group and Meadowridge Inc. Those companies provide more than 6.5 million plants each year and they work with Meijer to consolidate, sort and ship the containers to East Jordan Plastics.

Meijer also works with Dow Inc. on a program to recycle bags and flexible packaging into pavement used in parking lots at its stores.

Pets and babies have certainly made the past two years of business communications interesting.

For one example, look no further than Thursday's Polymer Points Live livestream when senior reporter Frank Esposito had to balance news of resin pricing changes with calming a dog during a thunderstorm.

As Frank reports, there are two big stories this week in pricing: a 3-cent increase in polyethylene prices and a pending excise tax on materials that is slated to begin July 1, expected to push costs up.

But just like pricing trends, sometimes things are difficult to predict, so you have to roll with changing conditions. If that means holding a small dog on your lap during a live video streaming session as a thunderstorm rolls through, well, that's just what you do.