Having been in the packaging industry for over a decade now, I’ve come to the conclusion finally that packaging will always be necessary given the growth of our population worldwide AND that it will be a problem most of the times.

Does this mean we should not have any hope or drive towards innovation as an industry? Of course not. It does mean that we have to be willing to follow the advice of Vanilla Ice and

Stop

Collaborate

And Listen

Come back with a brand new invention

STOP: We need to stop living on our islands and we need…

On resurrection and hope…

Today is my favorite day of the year. It’s a day of hope!

Now, I happen to stake my faith in a dark skinned, homeless, Jewish revolutionary who defeated death and came to life appearing to thousands and changing the history of the world. You may not…but together we can believe in hope and the power of resurrection.

Nature resurrects every spring in the blooming of flowers and beauty of trees.

I’ve witnessed relationships that should have been dead be resurrected back to life (I once preached in Rwanda and met 2 men who were crying…

The first time I met Camille Corr Chism was through LinkedIn and since then we have been able to connect up and talk packaging a ton. She was a guest on The People of Packaging Podcast, we share virtual happy hours through the IOPP, and many phone conversations about sustainable packaging.

I had reached out to her to help with this series because, in the words of Fred Schwarz, if Camille doesn’t know something about packaging, then it probably doesn’t exist! Basically, every time I talk with her, I think…

Here’s what she had to say about sustainable packaging…

For a little over 3 years, I was maniacal about time. Time management, time tracking apps, time budgeting, schedule blocking, pomodoro techniques. All of it. At the time, I was in graduate school for a Masters of Christian Leadership, helping to teach and lead a church of about 300 people, volunteering as the Chaplain of the Air Force Prep School basketball team, on 3 non profit boards, working a full time job in the packaging industry, with 5 young kids (under the age of 10) and 1 incredibly patient and loving wife.

I did realize a few very valuable…

I remember back in the days when I was a Youth Pastor (I was not a very good Youth Pastor, FYI…), there was this movement to make Christianity more relevant to the younger people. Heck, there is even a magazine that was birthed during that time called Relevant!

Relevance is important to be certain. What good is it to craft a fine sermon for a bunch of 14–17 year old’s if you can’t make the connection with them, right? Similarly, all of the sustainability goals you set and all the new materials and all the new marketing will be for…

The first 2 components of a SMART goal are Specific and Measurable, but the attainability portion is one of my favorite aspects of a good plan. Why? Because it’s the place where the most amount of back and forth should be happening in the room. I’m a contrarian by nature and so I love a good rigorous debate!

(Side note, if you can’t tell already, I love a good Simpsons gif!)

The “specific” and “measurable” portions are fairly objective in nature with binary questions to answer. Is this specific and how will we measure it? …

Part 1 of this short 5 part series covered the importance of being specific about your sustainable packaging goals. Specificity and measurability are closely linked for sure, but there is important distinction and I’ll make that here.

Setting measurable goals is just as important as level setting where you currently stand. In the book Gap Selling, Keenan does an excellent job of discussing the current state vs future state and encourages sales professionals to measure and sell to the gap. It’s a similar process when you are looking into strategic goal setting for sustainability. …

Nearly every major company has come out with some type of 2025 or another year goal for their sustainability pledge. Of course, this is needed given the change in buying demographics and power to younger generations as well as sorely needed for our globe. I’ve yet to meet a person working at a company who says, “you know what actually, we want our packaging to be much worse for the environment than it currently is. Can you also make it more expensive?”

So then, what are some ways we can help these companies focus some efforts on the area that…