The 2024 PPAI Product Responsibility Summit kicked off on Sunday, September 23, with a “101” session to familiarize attendees with the key issues and terminology for the product safety, compliance and sustainability discussions to come.
Karolyn Helda, global services and technical services director at QIMA (PPAI 517075, Standard-Base), provided an overview of regulations for children’s products, apparel, cosmetics and more. She also explained how decoration can shift a general use product to a children’s product with stricter requirements – for example, a reusable water bottle is a general use product, but that same bottle with a logo for a children’s day camp makes it a children’s product subject to additional testing and labeling requirements.
Rick Brenner, president of Product Safety Advisors (PPAI 668098, Standard-Base), emphasized that a product can be compliant but still not be safe and urged attendees to take product safety seriously, learn the basics and allocate money for product testing. He also advised that it’s important to make sure the testing labs they use are authorized to perform and certify the required tests. “Risk assessment is the most critical thing you can do,” he said, adding that it’s important to consider what could go wrong and test accordingly.
Elizabeth Wimbush, PPAI’s director of sustainability and responsibility, described the five pillars of the Association’s recent official definition of sustainability in the promotional products industry: “making, sourcing and distributing promotional items in ways that reduce negative environmental and social impacts while supporting long-term economic success.” She also provided a crash course in “the alphabet soup of acronyms” in sustainability, briefly explaining 21 terms from B Corp to SDG.
After the 101 panel, attendees gathered for a welcome reception with networking and refreshments, including a special welcome for representatives from the Promotional Product Professionals of Canada, British Promotional Merchandise Association and the Australasian Promotional Products Association.
Mark Kindness, CEO of APPA, spent 24 hours of flying time to attend the event and said it was well worth the effort. “Look at all the great people that you get to meet,” he said. “I think the U.S. is leading in the space at the moment, along with the U.K., so it was a great opportunity to come over and to work with the global associations first and then to see how it’s playing out in the U.S.”
Jonathan Strauss, president and CEO of PPPC, came to listen, learn and share with members back home. “I’m here as a conduit to hear what the conversations are, hear what the priorities are, so we can bring things back to our Canadian members and keep sharing with them,” he said. “I’ve learned a lot about traceability of products and the efforts that suppliers are going to.”
Nick Grieco, quality, compliance and sustainability manager for Gemline, the No. 11 supplier in the PPAI 100, is new to the industry and attending Summit for the first time. He said the company fields a lot of queries on testing, compliance and sustainability, and he appreciates the collegial spirit of the attendees.
“The people are so friendly,” Grieco said. “It’s a tight-knit community, even though we do compete with each other.”
