Just as I returned from vacation this week—a much needed trip to Cape Cod—I came back to the office just in time for me and the Rubber & Plastics News editorial staff to gear up for the fall conference and exhibition travel season.
As many of you in the rubber industry know, the spring and fall are when the calendars fill up, and everyone on our staff will be heading out to one or more events.
By the time you even read this, RPN will have completed our own International Tire Exhibition & Conference, a biennial event we hold here in Akron that focuses on the business of tire manufacturing. Also before you see this, Senior Reporter Mike McNulty will have been to the annual NIBA—The Belting Association's annual convention in Indianapolis.
The last week of September will find me at the International Society of Industrial Fabric Manufacturers fall meeting in Charlotte, N.C., where I not only will be covering the event for suppliers to the hose, belt and tire industries, but also delivering a speech on RPN's history and how covering the rubber industry has changed over the years.
The week of Oct. 10 will see myself, Washington Senior Reporter Miles Moore and Erin Pustay Beaven, our online content editor, covering the ACS Rubber Division's International Elastomer Conference and Expo in Pittsburgh. The week prior to that, Miles will have been at the Tire and Rubber Association of Canada's two-day conference on rubber recycling.
Not to be left out are Reporter Chris Sweeney, who will be at the Adhesive and Sealant Council's fall meeting in Indianapolis the week of Oct. 17, at the same time Managing Editor Don Detore will be in Germany for the triennial K Show for the rubber and plastics industries.
This will be the first time that RPN will be covering the K Show, and that gives me the opportunity to tout a collaboration we are doing at the show with sister publication European Rubber Journal. Both RPN and London-based ERJ are part of the Crain Polymer Group, and for the first time the two publications will combine to produce a series of five email newsletters both previewing and reporting on the K Show.
Don and ERJ Editor Patrick Raleigh will be working together to produce one newsletter to go out about a week before the show, one to coincide with the start of the show, and the remaining three to be delivered during the K Show. The newsletters will be sent to all who receive the daily email newsletters sent out by RPN and ERJ.
If you're interested in meeting with Don or Patrick at the K Show, contact Don at [email protected].
Meyer is editor of Rubber & Plastics News. He can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @bmeyerRPN.