FROM BACKYARD TO BIG COMPANY

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31975, 30 April 1969, Page 9

FROM BACKYARD TO BIG COMPANY

The Christchurch manufacturing plant of Plastic Products, Ltd, which is to be officially opened today, is further evidence of the company’s astounding growth since its inception at Hamilton 29 years ago.

From a small backyard shed employing a handfull of staff producing dolls on two old hand presses and using a home-made plastic “brew” of casein and sawdust, the company today operates four plants throughout the country and employs a staff of 600. The main manufacturing plant and the company’s engineering facility are located in Hamilton where the firm was bom, with other factories situated at Mount Wellington in Auckland, Naenae in Wellington, and now in Christchurch. The company also maintains a sales office in Dunedin. Plastic Products, which be- ducts through its blow-mould-eame a member of the Alex ing and injection-moulding Harvey group in 1964, manu- plants—-including both stanfactures a wide range of pro- dard and custom-moulded

containers, closures and specialty items. These products, many of which have found their way into every home in the country, include bottles of all shapes and sizes in polythene and clear PVC, jerrycans, 10 gallon drums, ballpoint pen components, lampshades, electrical fitments, plumbing fittings, safety heiments and milking machine equipment The company also manufactures polythene sheet film and layflat (including shrink film), mulch film, and building and agricultural film in widths up to 18ft One of the most important New Zealand “firsts” for the company is a clear stretchable PVC film for wrapping meat and produce, made by the firm's Mount Wellington plant and sold under the name “Stretchwrep." Polythene bags are another of the cmpany’s major activities. Among the many and diverse markets using this form of packaging one of the most important is the freezing industry where the film is used in the packing of frozen meat for export. The growth of fish and venison: exports have meant further’ requirements for export wrapping, while internal packaging uses range from textiles to frozen foods, hardware, to fresh produce. The technical achievements of plastic closures manufacture are best illustrated at I Plastic Products’ Hamilton plant which produces caps from the tiny size, for penecillin tubes—3/32 of an inch diameter—to jar lids 3* inches wide. Styrene sheeting and thinwalled thermoforming (for producing special plastic containers, chocolate end biscuit trays, etc.); polythene of PVC covered wire bag ties: polythene pipe; miscellaneous tube extrusions, profile extrusions; and another New Zealand first, polypropylene strapping, are among other products manufactured by the company’s plants. Specialised plastic products, however, have done much to build the division’s reputation as a versatile and progressive company. Among its innovations was the development and commercial production of the “Waikato" Weight and Rate Milk Meter, which was launched early in 1967. Other ingenious and intricate plastic mouldings have been developed by the division in the field of plumbing fixtures and include a pressure reducing valve, thermostat components and a filter stop cock. All are for domes- 1 tic and commerical applications. Other items include, for example, all-plastic single-I piece moulded grass catcher for motor mowers produced on the largest blow-mouiding machine in Australia or New Zealand (designed and built by the company) and several hundred thousand i-inch intri-cately-moulded plastic tiles for core board circuits at the Thames Valley Electric-Power Board.