This CD contains a special two-hour Webinar broadcast from December 5, 2007, that detailed up-to-the-minute insights into the market forces affecting package design and sustainability. The dense program ...
MNC Stribbons is a direct manufacturer of packaging accessories and components, providing customers with creative, decorative, and cost-effective packaging ideas.
The company has a line of recycled material products produced at two China plants that employ local artisans under working conditions and that might seem progressive even by Western standards. For instance, MNC Stribbons has programs to reduce employees’ commute time to and from the plant when possible and an onsite library to encourage self-education. The company’s Eco-Friendly Collection includes recycled poly ribbons, Raffia bows, and natural fiber bags and ribbons.
MNC Stribbons owns and operates a manufacturing facility located in Heshan, Guangdong Province, that has the capabilities to incorporate diverse mediums to meet specific project requirements. The large facility has state-of-the-art ribbon,
elastic, braided cord, twisted cord, injection molding, and printing machinery. The staff of over 600 skilled employees averages over 15 years of experience creating beautiful hand-tied bows, assemblies, cords, elastics, display components, and printed and custom injection molded products.
A second factory in Zhenping City, Henan Province, is powered by renewable energy, converted from coal-burning to a straw-burning facility. MNC recently acquired a company in the Philippines that manufactures products from indigenous abaca
and buri plants.
“To a large degree, we have been using sustainable operating principles for at least the last decade in our China factories,” says MNC Stribbons president Charles Vaughn. “We formally adopted sustainability as a key corporate strategy over four
years ago when we purchased a tract of land in a ‘green’ industrial park in central China.”
Many of MNC Stribbons’ innovative and decorative products have been reengineered to be less dependent on oil and other nonrenewable commodities. This has resulted in less price volatility for many of their raw materials. The company has also seen their labor turnover rates decline dramatically, reducing training costs and scrap levels and enhancing product development through skills retention.
MNC Stribbons’ specialty is the manufacture of decorative packaging components such as sheer ribbons, satin ribbons, bows, mini bows, elastic cord, stretch bows, braided cord, twisted cord, tassels, organza bags, pouches, cosmetic bags,
assemblies for handles, closures and mounting applications, POP display accessories, and hardware. To maintain the integrity of their sustainability efforts, company officials visit the production facilities of their suppliers and verify their representations of raw materials composition and production methods.
“Oftentimes, the benefits of adopting sustainable operating principles are difficult to quantify,” says Vaughn. “The operating cost reductions attributable to sustainable manufacturing practices are frequently insufficient to offset the increased raw
materials costs for sustainable products. The ability to offer a sustainable product for a price within 10% of the price of nonsustainable products is a victory in our minds.”
MNC Stribbons took a leading role in their packaging market segment by developing green products in response to market demand and by restructuring their operations and corporate strategy fundamentally to adopt sustainability as a core strategy. The company is always looking to reduce its carbon footprint, to empower and stimulate the creativity of its employees, and to be a more responsible member of the local
communities it affects. MNC Stribbons also works closely with local officials to assist in those environmental and social programs and local charities that will improve the communities, trying to be a positive source for change.