NPE 2000 ACHIEVES RECORD

NPE 2000 attracted a record 90,142 participants to Chicago's McCormick Place. Taking place over five days, the exposition was the largest in the 54-year history of NPE and by far the most international. "Because of an ambitious outreach program by SPI to attract even more international visitors, nearly one in five of the attendees at NPE 2000 came from outside the United States" said Jordan L. Morgenstern, SPI Vice President, Trade Shows.

Globalization was even more apparent among the 2,014 exhibiting companies, one-fourth of which came from outside the U.S. Still other exhibitors were the U.S. subsidiaries of firms based in other countries.

Also record-breaking was the amount of on-site processing output that was collected for recycling, ac cording to Susie Harpham of Eco Educators, one of the firms in charge of administering the NPE 2000 recycling program. Machines operating on the show floor yielded about 800,000 lbs. (363,000 kg) of plastic products and scrap, of which 355,000 lbs. (161,000 kg) were collected for recycling. (The remainder consisted of products given away to show visitors or pre-sold to customers of exhibiting companies.) "By collecting the lion's share of scrap generated at NPE 2000 and diverting it from Chicago landfills to productive reuse, the program has been a complete success," Harpham said.

For more information, contact The NPE 2000 Exposition Sponsor, The Society of the Plastics Industry, Inc., 1801 K Street NW, Suite 600, Washington, DC 20006-1301, 800-SP1-0015, 202-974-5235, Fax: 202-296-7243, E-mail: tradeshows@socplas.org, Web: www.npe.org.