Processor of the Year

Even while Comar LLC been growing, the company has focused on training, retaining workers, adding staff and keeping workers safe.

When Teel Plastics LLC was asked to boost output for test swabs, it immediately began running the parts 24/7 and then added even more extruded and injection molded swab capacity. The company has made more than 2 billion swabs since the start of the pandemic.

Community outreach has been difficult during the pandemic. But PTI Engineered Plastics managed to keep up with some longtime commitments and initiate some new ones.

Don Loepp: It will be tough for the 2022 finalists to match the outstanding results that we saw from this year's Processor of the Year award. But based on what they all said about the opportunities for North American processors, I have high expectations.

The plastics industry is seeing effects from resignations, refugees and recycling; Processor of the Year 2021 MMI Engineered Solutions is hiring refugees; and a rundown of all the shakeups at the Plastics Industry Association now that former CEO Tony Radoszewski has left the organization.

Doug Callahan: "2021 was the most volatile, chaotic, stressful year that we've ever been through in my 30 years in the industry. It was also the most successful year."

MMI Engineered Solutions Inc., a Saline, Mich.-based injection molder, blow molder and toolmaker, is Plastics News' 2021 Processor of the Year.

Teel Plastics, based in Baraboo, Wis., is a plastic extruder and injection molder of custom products for highly regulated end markets, including medical, water treatment, and industrial piping. The company has since rapidly expanded capacity to make swab stick handles for COVID-19 diagnostic test kits.