Kickstart: Rethinking coffee pods

It may be time to rethink the environmental impact of the coffee pod.

While the single-use pods popularized by Keurig Dr Pepper have been the target of many people who see them as unnecessarily wasteful, new studies are saying that's not quite true when you look at the big picture. In fact, a coffee pod may be better for the environment overall vs. standard coffee makers — and that's without taking into consideration if the coffee drinker recycles their polypropylene pods or uses a reusable pod.

A University of Quebec study — one of a few recent ones — examined the carbon footprint, noting that "the pollution resulting from the preparation of coffee at home is just the tip of the iceberg."

"To adequately compare the carbon footprint of several coffee preparation methods, it is important to consider their entire life cycle," from growing coffee to shipping and roasting it, the study notes.

Because pods are developed to use just the right amount of coffee and water, there's less waste and less energy needed during brewing.

"The impact of packaging, in general, is much, much smaller than the product itself," Shelie Miller, a professor of sustainable systems at the University of Michigan School for Environment and Sustainability, told the Washington Post.

For its 50th anniversary, blow molder Confer Plastics Inc. is bringing back one of its first products, a flexible funnel.

In a column for the Wellsville Sun, President Bob Confer says the funnel was developed and patented by his father, Doug Confer, and made in the family plastics business recently founded by his grandfather, Ray Confer.

The company saved the mold even after halting production when its patent ran out and put it back into short-term production as a celebration for its anniversary. An open house at the North Tonawanda, N.Y.-based company will take place later this year.

Confer Plastics is more known as a molder of spa and pool accessories now, but the funnel was "a product that helped us grow," Bob Confer wrote.

Ten years ago this week, Plastics News took a big step forward with a redesigned logo — in the newspaper business we call it a flag — and website.

Or maybe I should say it was a half-step forward.

For 24 years, our flag featured a rainbow design in block letters that was meant to show the versatility of plastics. It was pretty cool in 1989. But by 2013 the design was looking old fashioned.

But creating a new design that everyone could live with was hard.

Finally, after listening to all the complaints about redesign attempts, David Irvin (at the time our director of digital strategy and development) started messing around with some fonts and colors and came up with a new design that was modern enough to satisfy folks who wanted a change, yet retained enough of the old flag that it was acceptable to the rest.

Readers liked it, but we ended up using the new flag for just a couple of years. When Plastics News moved from Akron to Detroit, we hired a new art director in 2014. She was ready to redesign everything pretty much from her first day, but I made her wait about a year, thinking our readers couldn't handle that much change again so soon!

I really like our current design, although it's still fun to rediscover old issues and shirts with the old Plastics News rainbow designs. Retro can be cool, too.

(Thanks to Editor Don Loepp for this item.)