Kickstart: The next chapter at Myers

The last time Myers Industries Inc. set out to reframe its business, it put an emphasis on acquisitions within plastics under new CEO Mike McGaugh. That was in 2020.

"I like the products that are big and bulky and immune largely from overseas competition," McGaugh said shortly after taking the top post at Akron, Ohio-based Myers in 2020.

As that statement would indicate, much of Myers' growth came from acquisitions in rotomolding. It is now the second-largest rotomolder in North America with $225 million in annual sales in the region. When McGaugh came on board at Myers, it was ranked No. 8 with $56 million in sales in North America.

During the past year, the company has had to close plants to consolidate operations.

Now McGaugh has left the company and Myers has named an interim CEO as it begins "a leadership transition to support the continued transformation of the company."

What that transition will be wasn't released by the company in its Sept. 9 news release on its leadership change.

Myers' interim leader is Dave Basque, previously vice president of integration and its material handling business. Basque, like McGaugh, had a long work history at Dow prior to joining Myers, so they may be coming at Myers' future growth from similar backgrounds. In a news release, McGaugh said he is confident Basque and the leadership team "will continue to drive Myers' transformation."

So perhaps the next chapter in Myers' history may not differ drastically, but we'll have to wait and see.

The Atlantic hurricane season is expected to heat up again this week, with Francine potentially soaking an area of the U.S. Gulf Coast — including areas with big resin production sites — that has already faced heavy rainfall throughout the past couple of months.

Tropical Storm Francine is expected to become a hurricane by Sept. 11, according to the National Hurricane Center. Hurricane-force winds are forecast for Louisiana along with 4-8 inches of rain in Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi. NHC has issued a hurricane weather watch for a stretch of the Gulf Coast from Galveston Bay, Texas, to the western border of Alabama.

In July, Hurricane Beryl made landfall in the U.S. at Matagorda, Texas. Shutdowns related to the storm at resin production sites in Texas and Louisiana led to force majeure limits on resin supplies and higher costs.

There's a problem with tires that's unique to electric vehicles — and no, I'm not referring to Americans' reticence to buy more EVs. Because EVs have no engine noise, the sound of the tires on pavement seems much louder than in a traditional vehicle.

Polyurethane may be the solution.

Germany-based Henkel AG & Co. and its partners have developed a PU foam layer that provides an acoustic barrier for what it terms "silent tires." However, adding that foam inside the tire normally requires an extra manufacturing step, increasing costs by 25 percent.

Working with 4Jet Group, the companies developed a direct foam system to add the material within the tire on the existing production line without disrupting regular production.