Loepp was named Plastics News' editor in April 2011. After earning a journalism degree from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University in 1983, he worked as a reporter for eight years for the Milwaukee Journal and for the Daily Press and Times-Herald daily newspapers in Newport News, Va., before relocating to his native northeastern Ohio to join Crain. He joined Plastics News in 1991 as a reporter, was promoted to news editor in mid-1993, and became managing editor two years later.