TLMI committees map out initiatives for 2025

TLMI’s 2024 Committee Summit, held Dec 4-6 in Clearwater Beach, Florida, was TLMI’s final in-person event of the year, and it offered an opportunity for the organization’s volunteer committee members to gather and plan for the year ahead. 

'We literally set the agenda for the coming year,’ Patrick Potter, co-chair of the regulatory affairs committee and president of Flexo Wash, said in a TLMI video. ‘There’s follow-through; there’s accountability.’  

Each committee met in different rooms at the Sheraton Sand Key Resort to organize programs, put together working groups and detail initiatives. Here is what each group worked on. 

Technical Committee  

The technical committee discussed plans for webinars and newsletters for 2025, as well as for the upcoming in-person printThink conference, to be held June 10-12 in Rosemont, Illinois, in conjunction with the Amplify trade show. Some of the topics for these initiatives will include RFID, color management, coatings and AI. 

The committee also wants to increase the visibility of its Guru program, an initiative through which industry subject matter experts can provide help to members.  

Membership Committee 

The membership committee aims to enhance outreach to engage new members for 2025. 

This will involve encouraging greater participation from TLMI members in the ambassador program, where an experienced member will provide one-on-one outreach to less experienced members. The committee plans to create a checklist to help ambassadors in their roles. The committee is also interested in having designated tables for new members during in-person events so they feel more engaged and valued. 

Tara Halpin, co-chair of the membership committee’s engagement subcommittee and CEO of Steinhauser, said she plans to contact new members sooner and meet with ambassadors quarterly.  

In the face of mergers and acquisitions, the membership committee also wants to emphasize the number of facilities and the volume of sales dollars within TLMI.  

Regulatory Affairs Committee  

At the summit, the regulatory affairs committee, known as RAC, discussed various regulations and policies impacting members. The committee also discussed potential developments under the Trump administration and the incoming Congress. 

Throughout 2025, the committee will hold webinars on some of these topics. This may include Proposition 65 in California, extended producer responsibility and OSHA, the last of which was the subject of the most well-attended TLMI webinar this past year. 

Workforce Committee 

The workforce committee wants to focus on employee retention. During the summit, the committee developed a career path framework outlining information on hard and soft skills that employees can develop to advance their careers. The committee also aims to encourage greater participation from employees of member companies involved in TLMI, such as through peer groups. 

The committee also explored strategies for outreach to younger demographics, including high school students. 

Sustainability Committee  

The sustainability committee set up several subgroups to work on different initiatives, including environmental assessments, terminology clarification documents and reviewing and updating information sources. 

‘We need to better partner with our other committees here at TLMI, including the RAC and technical, and collaborate and listen so we can create new things together,’ said Maggie Naberezny, co-chair of the sustainability committee and films portfolio manager at Beontag. 

Liner Committee 

The liner committee focused on increasing participation in TLMI’s liner recycling initiative. The committee formed subgroups, dedicated to research, communications and outreach to different stakeholders, to address this. 

‘There's a lot of people generating liner out there that don't know about our story and that aren't part of TLMI, and we're going to look at some of those organizations,’ said Adam Frey, co-chair of the liner committee and vice president of Converter Direct at Wausau Coated Products. ‘We need to celebrate the wins and talk about the folks that are recycling liner.’ 

Matrix Committee 

The matrix recovery committee conducted surveys in 2019 and 2023, which indicated that an increasing amount of matrix is being diverted from landfills. 

‘That means that we’re doing the right thing,’ said Marco Acevedo, co-chair of the matrix committee and Northeast regional sales manager at Precision AirConvey. ‘It’s a great start, but we still have a long way to go.’ 

In the future, the committee plans to conduct more frequent surveys to gather the latest accurate data and develop more educational materials.