At Heartland Polymers, we are built for change. As we ramped up this past year, we also adapted to the world around us and our customer’s evolving needs.

As we approach the holiday season, we look back at what we have accomplished individually and collectively in the first three quarters and set our intentions for 2024. We were all encouraged by the announcement on Oct. 26 that U.S GDP grew at 5.2 per cent in the third quarter, beating expectations based on continued strong consumer spending, but we also face certain realities heading into 2024.

Geopolitics continue to impact global trade, and we see significant variances when it comes to projected economic growth in China and G8 nations. Here at Heartland Polymers, we are buoyed by the recent push up in pricing in polymer grade propylene.

On that note, here are a few highlights from the first three quarters:

Leading with quality

When we launched with our brand slogan of ‘we believe in better’, we took this challenge to heart across every part of the business, from production to sales and service.

On the product side, we have been extremely pleased to hear from clients that our homopolymer grade resins have performed exceptionally well. The anecdotal feedback has been heartening, and this has been validated via third-party testing that shows Heartland polypropylene has almost no detectable level of volatiles.  This is achieved by using the latest generation of catalyst and controlling and optimizing our additive levels. The less additives, the fewer things that can break down and create problems for the converter. All of this, of course, translates into an easier, more successful experience for the customer.  

Reactor grade value-add

Speaking of catalyst, Heartland’s ability to create high melt flow reactor grade polymers is another market differentiator that benefits our clients with increased performance and equipment efficiency. We’re able to process our products typically at lower temperatures and with less additives than many competitive products that are cracked to the same high melt flows. The result is resin with superior physical properties without adding any peroxide.  

Market penetration

We are heavy into contracting and qualifications for 2024, coming off a year that saw us make good inroads into the challenging non-wovens sector. Manufacturers continue to raise the bar to meet demand for products that are lighter and stronger. Our partners across the industrial and hygiene markets have benefited from Heartland’s fiber grade homopolymer (H5235G) which delivers low VOC, faster and better processing. We’ve also successfully developed products for the film extrusion, thermoforming, and injection molding markets, again with strong feedback from clients with diverse manufacturing needs.

In 2024, we will launch and begin delivering our random copolymer line, providing our customers with a variety of resins that deliver better impact strength and more clarity. Tougher and more durable, our random copolymers provide optimum performance at a broad range of melting points, delivering increased crack resistance and cold temperature resilience, high clarity and transparency, and flexibility across injection molding, blow molding, film extrusion, sheet extrusion and thermoforming.

See you at NPE

Looking way ahead to spring ’24 (which will arrive faster than we think), our team is looking ahead to a great turnout at NPE in Orlando May 6 – 10. This will mark Heartland’s first opportunity to show up with a main floor presence. We’ve been busy working on those details for months now, and I’m certain our exhibition presence will have impact as we look to meet new and old friends in this great industry.

I wish you all a successful end to the year and hope we cross paths soon.