UnPacked22
A virtual event on sustainable packaging
FEB 22 – 24, 2022
FEB 22 – 24, 2022

[3]
DAYS
[12+]
SPEAKERS
[Plus]
NETWORKING & WORKSHOPS
The Premiere Sustainable Packaging Event in the Pet Industry
UnPacked is a fully-virtual, action-oriented event dedicated to bringing together sustainable packaging experts and suppliers, as well as pet industry brands, manufacturers, and retailers, to learn more about one of our industry’s largest issues. We aim to unpack the ever-changing, quickly-developing details around packaging through world-class education. We will also provide resources and tools that will help us improve and advance sustainability of packaging in the pet industry to further decrease our overall waste footprint.
”I’ve attended many virtual conferences/trade shows and without a doubt you all produced the best!" - Spencer Williams, CEO West Paw
2022 Content
SPEAKERS
Our speakers will include innovative industry leaders from within the pet industry and outside of the industry covering a range of topics including: Sustainable Packaging 101, Packaging Circularity, Designing for Sustainable Packaging, Solutions for Flexible Plastic Packaging, Cross-Industry Collaboration Driving Improvement, and The Future of Sustainable Packaging.

Danielle Jezienicki
Sustainability Director
Grove Collaborative

Melissa Bauer
Director of Sustainability
Pet Sustainability Coalition

Rachel Sears
Sustainable Packaging Specialist
Pet Sustainability Coalition

Audrey Kriva
Climate & Circularity Consultant
Sustainable Business Consulting

Rhodes Yepsen
Executive Director
Biodegradable Products Institute

Michelle Carvell
COO
Lorax Compliance

Paula Luu
Project Director
Closed Loop Partners

Julianna Nienart
Project Associate
How2Recycle / GreenBlue

Alison Younts
Lead Sustainability Consultant
Trayak

David Yaskulka
SVP – Mid America Pet Food
Nature’s Logic

Brianna Sheppard
Senior Program Officer
World Wildlife Fund

Lindsey Ray
Senior Brand Manager
Catalyst Pet

Cherish Morrison
Senior Category Manager
MudBay

Brian Steinwagner
Executive VP Business Development
Morris Packaging

Michael Cody
Global ESG Director
Earth Animal

Sandi Childs
Consultant
The Association of Plastic Recyclers

Svanika Balasubramanian
Co-Founder & CEO
RePurpose Global

Dan Goodnow
CEO
The Natural Dog Company

Rachel Kipar
Circular Ventures Manager
The Recycling Partnership
TICKETS
For 50% OFF PSC Member Discount on tickets
please contact your member specialist
SCHEDULE
DAY 1 – TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 22
INTRODUCTION
Pet Sustainability Coalition
Melissa Bauer, Director of Strategic Initiatives & Sustainability Programs &
Rachel Sears, Sustainable Packaging Specialist
Description: Welcome to UnPacked22!
KEYNOTE
Grove Collaborative
Danielle Jezienicki, Sustainability Director
Description: Grove Collaborative, a certified B Corp, is one of the fastest growing online retailers, and is specifically dedicated to sustainability. Today, Grove creates and curates 150+ sustainable, high-performing brands that meet their four-point standard: uncompromisingly healthy, beautifully effective, ethically produced, and cruelty-free. At Grove, every order is plastic neutral. Every shipment is carbon neutral. And by 2025, Grove will be 100% plastic-free. Please join PSC and Grove Collaborative as they discuss building a retailer around sustainability, the challenges they’ve had along the way, and the future we see for selling products that are good for the people, pets, and the planet.
2021 SUSTAINABLE PACKAGING SPOTLIGHT
Pet Sustainability Coalition
Melissa Bauer, Director of Strategic Initiatives & Sustainability Programs
Description: Sustainable packaging is a fast moving and often technical topic. In this session we will cover 2021 with broad brush strokes sharing major milestones, brand commitments, and legislative changes.
EXHIBIT HALL BREAK
FLEX FORWARD & BEYOND
Pet Sustainability Coalition
Melissa Bauer, Director of Strategic Initiatives & Sustainability Programs
Description: The pet industry has a 300 million pound packaging problem that requires both short term action and long term solutions. Get an update on Flex Forward, the successful return to retail pilot program that collected 8,000+lbs of plastic pet food and treat packaging. Learn what life these multi-laminate bags may take on as we share the first look at testing results from recycling trials completed just weeks ago. Then, learn about the framework developed by the US Plastics Pact to develop long term solutions toward more sustainable packaging that may advance the pet industry beyond current hard-to-recycle materials.
RECYCLABLE: What does “recyclable” really mean?
Closed Loop
Paula Luu, Project Director
Description: Recycling has been a cornerstone of the environmental movement but a lot has changed as the world attempts to recycle a wider range of materials and recycling infrastructure advances Learn more about recyclability and different recycling methods including advanced/chemical. Take a look at the challenges inhibiting successful recycling and where new opportunities are emerging.
REFILLABLE: Opportunites/challenges/ measuring environmental benefit of refillable systems
Trayak
Alison Younts, Lead Sustainability Consultant
Description: Refillable containers often seem like a silver bullet solution to many of our packaging woes, but it’s never that simple! Uncover the environmental impact of refillable packaging through lifecycle modeling.
COMPOSTABLE: Compostable Packaging: An introduction and infrastructure overview
Biodegradable Products Institute
Rhodes Yepsen, Executive Director
Description: Compostable packaging encourages organic recycling of discarded food products and diverts waste out of landfills and into composting sites where the package and the organic waste inside it decompose into healthy compost. However, less than 3% of all households in North America have access to composting infrastructure. What does the future look like for compostable packaging and what is a roadmap to ensure composting infrastructure is build to be most effective?
EXHIBIT HALL BREAK
NETWORKING
Pet Sustainability Coalition
Description: Join PSC and our members for co-hosted peer networking sessions
SOIREE
Pet Sustainability Coalition
Description: Please join PSC, several PSC members, and partners as we announce an exciting a new packaging program for the entire pet industry over a year in the making!
DAY 2 – WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 23
EU/UK MAKING SENSE OF CHANGING SUSTAINABLE PACKAGING LEGISLATION ACROSS EUROPE
Lorax Compliance
Michelle Carvell, COO
Description: Legislation related to packaging is a large and complex topic, especially when considering different legislation in different geographies. Keeping on top of the latest and pending legislation on topics such as Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR), post-consumer (PCR) mandates, labeling requirements, and more can have vast market and financial implications. Please join PSC and Lorax Compliance for the latest updates on packaging and packaging material regulations in the E.U.
EU/UK NETWORKING & PRESENTATION Q&A
Pet Sustainability Coalition
Description: Join us in the Skyview lounge to connect with other purpose driven leaders who work in your department and share similar responsibilities. These are smaller group sessions that last between 30 – 45 minutes led by peer PSC member companies. Attendees report that networking with fellow attendees is one of the best parts of Impact Unleashed!
INTRODUCTION
Pet Sustainability Coalition
Melissa Bauer, Director of Strategic Initiatives & Sustainability Programs &
Rachel Sears, Sustainable Packaging Specialist
Description: Welcome to Day 2!
INTERSECTION BETWEEN CLIMATE + PACKAGING
Sustainable Business Consulting
Audrey Kriva, Climate & Circularity Consultant
Description: Oftentimes packaging and climate are seen as two separate issues sometimes even with competing priorities. In this session we will explore how climate and packaging are connected and what businesses can do to address both packaging and climate with supporting strategies.
SOCIAL JUSTICE IMPLICATIONS OF PLASTIC PACKAGING CRISIS
Repurpose Global
Svanika Balasubramanian, Co-founder & CEO
Description: The facts around plastic waste is staggering. There is an estimated 15-51 trillion microplastics floating in our ocean right now. The plastic isn’t contained to our ocean either, it is in the air and foods we eat to the point where each person is estimated to consume a credit card worth of plastic every week. However, the people saddled with this growing crisis are overwhelming not the people causing it. Over 50 million informal waste workers across the developing world (like the Dalits in India) have been struggling to deal with the plastic problem for decades and 3 Billion people worldwide don’t have access to proper waste collection.. In this talk rePurpose Global will look at the social justice implications of our waste problem, and offer possible solutions for action.
PLASTIC NEUTRAL PANEL
Repurpose Global, Natural Dog Company, Nature’s Logic, & Catalyst Pet
Description: You’ve probably heard of carbon neutral but what about plastic neutral? Hear from three pet companies who are actively measuring and offsetting their plastic footprints with rePurpose Global, PSC’s global plastic offsetting partner.
EXHIBIT HALL BREAK
NORTH AMERICAN LEGISLATIVE UPDATE
The Association of Plastic Recyclers
Sandi Childs, Consultant
Description: Legislation related to packaging is a large and complex topic, especially when considering different legislation in different geographies. With different countries, states, and even localities passing their own versions of legislation, keeping on top of the latest and pending legislation on topics such as Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR), post-consumer (PCR) mandates, labeling requirements, and more can have vast market and financial implications. Please join PSC and the Association for Plastics Recyclers for the latest updates on packaging and packaging material regulations in North America.
DEEP DIVE INTO HOW2RECYCLE LABELING PROCESS
HOW2RECYCLE
Julianna Nienart, Project Associate
Description: Variation in recycling programs, unclear labeling, and inaccurate recyclability claims make proper recycling a challenge. The How2Recycle label was created to provide consistent and transparent on-package recycling information to consumers in North America. Please join How2Recycle and PSC as we discuss the importance of standardized labeling, as well as ways for packaging suppliers and pet companies to get more materials in the recycling bin by taking the guesswork out of recycling.
NETWORKING
Pet Sustainability Coalition
Description: Join PSC and our members for co-hosted peer networking sessions
EXHIBIT HALL BREAK
TED SERIES
MudBay & Morris Packaging
Description: Join us for short 8-10 minute presentations from two of this year’s leading PSC members and get inspired by their efforts to drive positive impact on the environments and communities where they do business. Then, join us for an interactive panel to ask the hard questions!
UPDATE FROM US PLASTICS PACT
US Plastics Pact
Brianna Sheppard, Senior Program Officer
Description: The US Plastics Pact aims to ensure that plastics never become waste by eliminating the plastics we don’t need, innovating to ensure that the plastics we do need are reusable, recyclable, or compostable, and circulating all the plastic items we use to keep them in the economy and out of the environment. Join us for an update and unveiling of plastic packaging that has been deemed “unnecessary or problematic” and therefore is a leading priority for the US Plastics Pact moving forward.
PSC STATEMENT ON PROBLEMATIC PACKAGING
Pet Sustainability Coalition
Melissa Bauer, Director of Strategic Initiatives & Sustainability Programs
Description: As a formal US Plastics Pact partner, the Pet Sustainability Coalition will announce a clear definition of problematic or unnecessary packaging that should be minimized or eliminated as soon as possible.
USPP + PSC COMBINED Q&A
US Plastics Pact + Pet Sustainability Coalition
Brianna Sheppard, Senior Program Officer &
Melissa Bauer, Director of Strategic Initiatives & Sustainability Programs
Description:
CLOSE
DAY 3 – THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 24
WORKSHOP: PLASTICS IQ DEMO
Recycling Partnership, Earth Animal
Rachel Kipar, Circular Ventures Manager & Michael Cody, Global ESG Director
Description: Plastic IQ is a cutting-edge digital resource to help companies develop an effective plastic packaging strategy, work together to compare strategies with industry best practices, and prioritize innovative solutions to advance circularity and corporate sustainability goals by 2030 or sooner. Created by The Recycling Partnership and SYSTEMIQ, with support from Walmart, Plastic IQ leverages industry guidance and data to help users turn their plastic packaging strategy into measurable actions to help tackle the plastic waste crisis. Join us for a live demo and walkthrough of this exciting new tool, now available to PSC members!
WORKSHOP: MARKETING CLAIMS ON PACKAGING/GREEN GUIDES
Pure Strategies
Ariella Sela, Sustainability Advisor & Cheryl Baldwin, Vice President of Consulting
Description: Packaging serves a number of different functions. Various forms of boxes, bottles, cans, plastic bags and pouches furnish protection and freshness, but they also act as advertising for the products they contain. Producers and packagers share responsibility with other marketers to bring truthful information to consumers. When crafting public statements about the sustainability or environmental safety of their products and services, companies should consider advertising rules and principles, including guidelines specifically designed to help marketers avoid making deceptive environmental marketing claims, and labeling rules for particular types of products or claims. In this workshop we will be guiding companies on how to best market the sustainability of their packaging and products while also sticking to applicable rules and regulations, like the FTC Green Guides.
Sponsors
Thank you to these event sponsors
TESTIMONIALS
A TASTE FROM 2021
Keynote: Bear Naked Granola (Kellogg)
A sustainability journey toward a fully recyclable stand-up pouch
Pet Businesses Using Life Cycle Analysis - Panel
WellPet, Earth Animal, Tyler Packaging