Plastic Bank seeks market at K for ‘social plastic'

Plastic Bank hopes K 2022 can catapult the social enterprise more firmly into the plastics industry. The company operates a software platform and builds networks that link more than 600 recycling centers in developing nations.

Founded in 2013, it has grown fast enough in recent years that it is getting enough volume of recycled plastic in its network to branch out to exhibiting at its first plastics show, said David Katz, founder and chief commercial officer.

"There's some significance for us, as the company has matured and been able to grow to a place to be able to support the volumes that companies attending the K fair may be looking for," Katz said. "We're growing exponentially."

The Vancouver, British Columbia-based firm said its network has collected about 60 million kilograms of plastic thus far — the equivalent of 3 billion bottles — and at K is exhibiting products made by major consumer product brands using its materials, including S.C. Johnson & Son Inc., Henkel and outdoor furniture maker ScanCom.

He said about half of Plastic Bank's volume thus far has been used by S.C. Johnson, which has made very public announcements about using ocean-bound plastic in its packaging.

Katz said Plastic Bank wants to build stronger ties in the plastics industry, as it seeks more markets for the recycled PET, polypropylene, and high and low density polyethylene that the network produces.

At K, the company says it will commit to stopping 50 ocean-bound plastic bottles for every attendee who signs up for the company's "Ocean Steward" program, but it's also focused on building relationships with companies. It has had about a dozen such arrangements with firms in the plastics industry, including injection machinery maker Engel Group.

More of its work, though, has been with consumer products companies that use Plastic Bank's blockchain-secured platform to verify and trace where material comes from and follow it through the supply chain.

The bank hopes its K 2022 appearance can strengthen its network within the plastics industry, whether that's recyclers, packaging makers or other companies.

"We haven't been targeting the plastics industry as broadly as we are now, so we'll see how it changes," Katz said.

He said he thinks price sensitivity and competitiveness among plastics firms have at times been barriers — "it's sometimes the Wild West in the plastics industry" — as well as the newness of the bank's business model, which has consumer product firms at times paying premiums to support a stable price for the material, which it calls "social plastic."

"We offer social plastic, which is a different material type than recycled plastic," Katz said. "It's priced as social plastic. Compared to recycled plastic, there may and sometimes may not be a difference in price."

At the collection centers, people can turn in plastic for credits that can be immediately used to pay school tuition or buy medical insurance, internet access, drinking water or other things.

The idea, he said, is to try to turn plastic into a form of money to incentivize its collection. Instability in global plastics pricing is felt very strongly by people trying to earn money collecting it in developing countries, he said.

"We provide a space for the world to use plastic to help end poverty," he said. "We address that by treating it like money."

The group has recycling centers in its network around the world, including the Philippines, Indonesia and Brazil.

"We need to be in the areas with the greatest injustice, with the greatest volume of material entering the oceans," Katz said. "It's no coincidence that those come in areas of poverty."

He hopes some in the industry can see "social plastic" as a new business model, potentially even distinct from recycled plastic.

"The industry should try to embrace and lean forward and take it on as a new category," Katz said.

He argues it's not altruism to pursue the business model — consumers and employees are looking for it also.

"You're looking at a new consumer that is passionate not just about the environment, climate, marine [issues] but they're passionate about where they're going to work," Katz said. "If you're not investing in those products and processes that [are about] the authenticity of making change in the world, you will not hire new talent."

As part of that he believes consumers are more accepting of imperfections in appearance that may come with recycled plastic, as well as being more generally concerned about plastic in the environment.

"The flood of virgin plastic is the contributor to what we see happening in the environment," Katz said. "And simultaneously we now do see a consumer who is not standing for that."

The bank's model taps into that, Katz said, by helping companies show to consumers, in a credible way, the traceability of the material they use in their packaging.

"The consumer has the ability to authentically understand that their purchase makes a difference," he said.

In an interview, Katz said the bank sees itself as an advocate for plastics.

"We're big advocates for the industry, we're big advocates for the material, we're big advocates for the ocean," he said. "If every piece of packaging was easily exchangeable for $5, we wouldn't see any in the environment.

"How might we steward it all and change the paradigm that society has against the material — unjustly so?" Katz said. "It's not the material, it's the way we've been handling it that is the root of the challenges."