We've had the good fortune to meet many engineers, managers, and business owners in all types of businesses, who are also musicians. I'm pleased to share my favorite Intercept Technology Packaging success story with this intriguing short video presented by Greg Spitz. If you're a musician, know anyone who is, or you just love music, you'll want to watch.... stringed instruments players, you may recognize the copper-colored bag shown in this video.

Perhaps you’ve noticed the increased quality and style in Liberty Packaging’s shared content over the last year. This improvement can be attributed to our newest creative and tech staffer, Greg Spitz.  Certainly, his last two videos “Corrosion - Its Natural” and “ESD and Static - Fun With Science” are unique and engaging.  Greg took on two very complex subjects which continue to be studied in great detail by generations of scientists, engineers, and other specialists. There are associations, companies such as Liberty Packaging, seminars, white papers, trade shows and other groups specifically geared to the study and management of corrosion and ESD.  Greg stepped back to view the big picture on these issues and simplified them for two three-minute videos that just make sense. We urge you to take a look.

Oh, paints! One of my pet peeves as a homeowner is when it comes time to use the paints for touch-up after they’ve been stored for a time, they are a mess and unusable (see gunky rusty metal paint can at left compared to nice clean paint can after storage in Intercept packaging). The cans become rusty and cruddy, the paint inside and thick, gunky, with rust particles from the can floating through it. The issue for me then becomes the disposal of up to a half gallon of bad paint. The oil-based paints are deposited at the town’s hazardous waste drop-off, collected once a year, which is fine if I am available on that day. Latex paints are supposed to be dried out and placed in the general trash...I don’t like that. Drying out paint in the can is an unrealistic chore. Disposing of paint in the general trash pickup just doesn’t feel right.

Intercept Technology requires a high level of service and response for our customers’ needs. In doing so we get very involved with our customers and we carry that mentality to our suppliers, distributers, and peers. I have been a Team Captain for a St. Baldrick’s event in Washington D.C. for the last two years. Both of these events have been successful in the area of fundraising, over $35,000 each time going to childhood cancer research, and in raising awareness. Each participant shaves his/her head to emulate cancer patients. This cause is important to me because my niece has recently completed a 2+ year treatment for Philadelphia Chromosome Leukemia. Each year I have traveled to the event, participated, and fundraised, and returned home with less hair!

Corrosion can be explained as a natural phenomenon, however, we still need to understand how best to keep products, machinery, electronics, parts small and large, safe from corrosion, rust and degradation. This quick video is rich with information: 

Here's an entertaining and informative look at some of the basics of electrostatic discharge, hosted by our favorite Science Guy, Don Donovan, Head of the Science Department at Thayer Academy. 

Environmental award-winning Intercept Technology Packaging has a 20+ year history of helping companies store and ship their products around the world, reducing waste, reducing reworks and defects and more! Do you want to reduce or eliminate the use of protective oils in your warehouse or manufacturing plant? With Intercept packaging, you can easily do that.

Even if you are an electrical engineer and these are elementary terms from your high school and college days, it may be fruitful to review their meanings and logic to see if you currently have sufficient packaging to protect your company’s products and assets.  

At Liberty Packaging, where our clients are mostly industrial manufacturers, we have labeled the month of February ESD Month, as the weather across much of the United States is colder with less humidity.  Electrostatic discharge is more likely to happen at this time of the year, for instance, when you pull two articles of clothing apart, you hear that crackling noise (charge devise model or CDM) or when you walk across the carpet to touch a metal door knob and zap!....that's the Human Body Model (HBM). 

As JFK famously stated: "Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present, are certain to miss the future." During my 18 years in the packaging business, I've watched companies large and small deal with change. It's sometimes easy, often challenging, and the individuals charged with change implementation feel the weight of responsibility to their company and co-workers to get it done right. After all, why make a change, if it doesn't make your business more efficient, with less waste and more savings to the bottom line? The rewards of well-considered change are clear.