Silgan Closures Teams Up with Neshannock Township for New Plastic Picnic Tables

When Neshannock Township decided it was time to replace their aging outdoor picnic tables, they began searching for alternatives to the traditional wood tables. “We considered alternate materials like plastic and metal tables”, said Mark Bucci, Parks and Recreation Director. “And when we considered plastic, we engaged a local New Castle plastic packaging company, Silgan Closures, to partner with us in this possible venture”.

The tables they selected are part of Green Tree Plastics, LLC’s CPR Project (Corporate Partners Recycle), and made from 100% recycled plastic. Green Tree Plastics, an Evansville, IN based company manufactures the tables with scrap plastic shipped from Silgan Closures. They manufactured 8 picnic table (last April) and Neshannock Township has ordered 8 more this spring. “It was logical and strategic to go with recycled plastic to assist our community’s effort to reduce plastic waste, eliminate it from going to the landfill and find common sense reuse for the plastic”, according to Mark.

The Silgan facility is literally right down the street from a Neshannock Park and the CPR Project provides a great outlet for the plastic and meets one of Silgan’s key goals to reduce plastic waste and partner with local organizations to be good stewards of the environment. “We are excited to work with Mark and Neshannock Township on this project to find practical reuse for our plastics” said AJ Miller, Director of Marketing for Silgan. “One of our sustainability goals is to increase recycling at our plants by finding uses for our plastic scrap. Working with Green Tree Plastics assists with meeting those goals and the bonus is that the employees of our New Castle plant can enjoy the tables at the park”. Green Tree Plastics is a family-owned company in Evansville and been in the business of producing plastic outdoor furniture, lumber, and custom products from 100% recycled plastic for over 15 years.

Green Tree Plastics works with corporations on projects like this one but also has a very large youth organization program called ABC Promise Partnership Program. The ABC Promise Partnership is a complete core skill building and relationship building program designed to provide youth organizations a vehicle to collect and sort discarded plastic caps and closures while helping the environment, gaining adult mentors, learning about recycling and the different post-consumer plastics, making lasting friendships within their peer structures, and developing core life skills. By collecting enough discarded plastic caps, the kids can purchase various outdoor products but primarily park benches. To date Green Tree Plastics has worked with over 7,000 youth organizations across more than 44 states coast to coast and produced over 16,000 benches.