OK, plastics people, the long wait is over. We're about to head to Orlando, Fla., to hang out with almost 60,000 of our closest friends for a week at NPE2024!
Months — or actually years —of planning will culminate in the five-day event that starts May 6 at the Orange County Convention Center. More than 2,000 companies will cover more than 1 million square feet of floor space with the best the plastics world has to offer.
This year's event is even more highly anticipated, since the triennial cycle was disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic in 2021. Six years is a long time in the modern world.
The week will go by fast, but in the interest of being a good conversation starter, here are seven fun facts to make yourself seem like an expert during NPE2024:
• Chris Taylor, vice president and general manager of the Crain Global Polymer Group, which includes Plastics News, worked for the Orlando Fury hockey team in the 1999-2000 season.
• The Orlando metro area was the 22nd largest in the U.S. as of 2020, with a population of almost 2.7 million. On its own, Orlando was the 62nd largest city in the U.S. in 2022, with a population estimated at just over 316,000.
• The origin of the city's name is a mystery. It was named after either a character in the Shakespeare play As You Like It or one of several possible dead soldiers or a landowner.
• Orlando was known as Jernigan — the last name of an early settler — until the late 1850s. It even appears as Jernigan on some older Florida maps.
• Nineteen players with the first name Orlando have played in Major League Baseball, as well as 15 in the NFL and six in the NBA.
• Pop singer Tony Orlando had 17 Top 40 hits from 1961-76, including 13 with Dawn, the duo of singer Telma Hopkins and Joyce Vincent. Orlando's birth name was Michael Orlando Cassavitis.
• Walt Disney World opened in Orlando in 1971. It now employs almost 80,000 and covers 25,000 acres, more than half of which has been developed.
Have a great NPE2024!