Convention Herolds Industry Changes

ISRI's eighth annual convention in Las Vegas urges members to take hold of the forces that are shaping the future of the industry.

Anyone who’s been a part of the scrap processing and recycling industry over the past two years is no stranger to the concept of change. After nearly three years of sluggish markets at the outset of the 1990s, worldwide economic recovery has paved the way for soaring prices for most recyclable commodities over the past 18 to 24 months.

Against this backdrop of sweeping market changes, the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries encourages its membership to "Catch the Winds of Change" at its annual convention and scrap recycling industry exposition March 19 through 22, at the Mirage Hotel in Las Vegas.

While the Las Vegas setting may be familar to previous ISRI convention participants, major changes in presentation, physical surroundings, and format are planned for the 1995 convention.

"What we’ve tried to do with the convention is make it a statement that will stand for both the association and the industry in general," says David "Cap" Grossman, president of ISRI. "We’re trying to make it warmer, friendlier, more accommodating, more customer-service oriented."

Grossman will present the annual report on the industry at the president’s breakfast on Monday, March 20 at 8 a.m. A variety of industry and general business sessions will occupy the following two days.

Workshops include a session on exploring quality control issues facing the scrap industry and raw material supplier audits and certification. Speakers will explain how their quality control programs work and offer advice on how other businesses can profit from such programs.

Other programs include workshops covering the paper recycling industry and a comprehensive review of the glass recycling process, both on Tuesday, March 21.

ISRI’s Paper Stock Industries Chapter and Nonmetallics Division will host "Profit$ from Scrap Paper: A Processor’s Perspective," on Tuesday at 2 p.m.. The program will address such topics as buying, grading, baling and selling of scrap paper, with a particular focus on expanding the product line of the traditional metal processor.

Confirmed speakers for the paper workshop include Stan Litman, president of Texas Recycling/Surplus Inc., Dallas, and president of the Paper Stock Industries Chapter; Ray Petermeyer, vice president of E-Z Recycling Co., Portland, Ore., and chapter treasurer; Al Kublin, president of Simco Recycling Corp., Miami, and co-chairman of the chapter’s standards and practices committee; and Martin Davis, president of Midland Iron & Steel, Moline, Ill. Steve Vento, vice president/international at William Goodman & Sons, Sunrise, Fla., and chairman of ISRI’s Nonmetallics Division, will moderate the workshop.

The Nonmetallics Division will present a glass cullet workshop entitled "Glass Recycling: A Clear (Amber and Green) Business Venture," also on Tuesday, at 3:30 p.m. An audio-visual presentation will enable workshop participants to "visit" several glass cullet processing facilities in North America and "meet" their principles.

The workshop will also feature a panel discussion with several industry experts. Confirmed speakers include: Bruce Brenner, president of Cycle Systems, Roanoke, Va., and chairman of ISRI’s glass committee; Kathy Richter, communications director for Anchor Glass, Tampa, Fla.; Clifford Klotz, vice president of government and environmental affairs at American National Can, Chicago; Jerald Bannister, director of recycling/public affairs at Owens-Brockway Glass, Toledo, Ohio; and Paul Hummel, manager of recycling at Ball Glass, Muncie, Ind.

In addition to the workshops, commodity spotlights will bring together authorities to discuss copper, iron and steel, aluminum, nickel/stainless steel, and precious metals.

ISRI’s Public Relations Committee will present a workshop entitled "What Are We -- Chopped Liver?" The discussion will feature Richard Kahlenberg, environmental columnist for the Los Angeles Times; Kathleen Meade, communications director of the National Reycling Coalition; and Evelyn Haught, ISRI’s director of public relations, all of whom will address the question of why the traditional scrap recycling industry appears to be inreasingly invisible in positive news coverage of recycling. Steve Brown, chairman of ISRI’s Public Relations Committee, will moderate the program.

In addition to industry-specific sessions, the convention will include presentations addressing more general issues of economics and business management.

Dr. John Stoessinger, an internationally recognized political analyst and author of numerous books on world politics, will analyze the race for economic dominance as the world moves toward the year 2000. Stoessinger will address ways that North American companies can compete in a global market flanked by integration in Europe and rapid growth in Asia.

Leonore Hausner, a widely-acclaimed school consultant and an authority in the field of family interactions and crisis intervention, will give presentations on "The Highs and Lows of Family Business," as well as "Superwomen -- The Dilemma for Women in the 1990s."

CUTLER URGES OPENNESS AMID INDUSTRY CHANGES

"Catch the Winds of Change" is more than a convention slogan to Herschel Cutler, executive director of the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries. It’s an industry-wide rallying cry for recyclers in the midst of economic and political changes.

"Everything needs to be looked at," says Cutler. "We’re in a society and an economy where nothing is a given. Change for the sake of change isn’t what we’re talking about, but a willingness to accept and act on the need for change is what survival is all about...It’s a way of saying ‘let’s not take anything for granted, let’s start with zero-based budgeting, let’s look at everything that we’ve done and everything that we’ve been suggesting and advocating.’ It’s just a logical management concept that at some point you should stop and say, ‘does what we’re doing make sense?’"

This philosophy of stepping back and re-evaluating policies and procedures as part of a bigger picture is one that ISRI leadership has already begun to embrace over the last few years, he says.

"In the area of government affairs, you can’t just take a position and not look at what’s happening and what might have changed around it," he says. "You have to evaluate it on a continuing basis."

This approach will be most evident in the ISRI convention itself, which Cutler promises to be "very different, in terms of programming, sequencing, format and many of the other facets that people had just gotten used to because they had been repeated so many times."

However, one aspect of ISRI’s agenda that has remained largely unchanged is the list of environmental and regulatory issues that the association faces in 1995, Cutler notes.

"You can’t get away from government affairs," he says, listing Superfund, the Basel Convention, flow control and the Clean Water Act as just a few environmental concerns the association and its membership will continue to grapple with. "None of those things get solved in six months, as is true of so many political issues facing so many industries."

The best way to respond to these issues has yet to be determined, says Cutler, as the new legislative power structure resulting from the Congressional overhaul of last fall continues to position itself in the early months of 1995.

"We’re not going to be in the first 100 days of this Congress (at the time of the convention)," says Cutler. "There’s still a lot to learn about what the change in the Congressional majority is going to mean in terms of the ability to legislate pro- or not-so-pro-recycling legislation. That question is still being looked at, but there is no reason to believe that there would be major change."

While commodity market activity late last year and early in 1995 has been very strong, with slowdowns appearing only in recent months, Cutler cautions processors who may fancy renewed market strength as a harbinger of a new era in recycling.

"I don’t think the textbook on supply and demand has been rewritten," he says. "I think the same rules are still in effect. It’s still a commodity-based market, influenced by world affairs and the price and costs of substitute materials. I would have to believe that there has been no basic underlying change in the ups and downs of the marketplace."

GROSSMAN SEES MEMBER SERVICES AS PARAMOUNT

Cap Grossman could not have asked for better timing. Midway through his term as president of the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries, he is the first to admit that the resurgence in recyclable commodity markets has cast the first half of his presidency in the most favorable light possible.

"My first year will probably be judged by many people as having been instrumental in carrying the industry to the height of the market," he laughs.

In more serious terms, however, Grossman says the association has improved in its efforts to add value to its services to the association membership.

"I think we’ve gotten a little bit better at asking ourselves the question, ‘are we satisfying our members, and if not, what do we need to do to make it better?’" says Grossman. "I think we have our leadership more keyed into the whole notion of customer service."

He admits that partisan forces at work during last year’s Congressional session got in the way of a number of ISRI’s legislative goals, "but I think we did a tremendous job in spite of the political impasse in Washington. We’re cerainly going to build on the foundation that we set up in 1994, and go back to Capitol Hill completely reloaded and re-armed. I think we’re going to try to take our grassroots involvement to a much higher level than it ever has been in the past, and try to see if we can be successful in the Superfund arena, as well as flow control."

ISRI needs to keep swinging on the legislative front, but Grossman that it might help to asociation to "get a better understanding of where the pitcher is pitching."

Although he doesn’t deny the importance of environmental compliance and other regulatory issues relative to the industry, he has "tried to redirect some of ISRI’s focus toward the importance and significance of recognizing that customer service is what’s going to keep you in business long after you’ve spent the money for environmental compliance, or whatever else it takes to be successful in this competitive industry. It’s still a matter of how good you are at satisfying your customers."