BPF holds highly successful networking day for members
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On 1 July 2025, the BPF held a highly successful 'meetings day' for its members to network. Over 200 people attended, and the event featured over 25 speakers, making it the second largest event after the BPF Annual Dinner. 70 BPF members arrived the night before, attending a dinner and drinks at the hotel hosting the event. The feedback about the dinner was very positive and many valuable business discussions took place.
The trade association represents the entire plastics supply chain, includingh raw material suppliers, machinery and equipment companies, converters and recyclers. These groups tend to meet multiple times per year, but the BPF has begun organising an annual event too, where all the groups attend meetings in one place, to facilitate networking and cross pollination of ideas. This was the second iteration of the event, which took place in Nottingham.
The morning of the event involved some post-breakfast networking, followed by eight ‘group’ (sub sector) meetings for a couple of hours to discuss the issues most pertinent to them.
Lunch was followed by highly interesting presentations relevant to the entire plastics industry. The lunch was kindly sponsored by two BPF members: Listgrove and Sierra 57 Consult.
After a brief overview and introduction from BPF Director General Philip Law, during which he explained the value of the event in bringing together the industry, the afternoon session kicked off with a talk from Head of Business & Labour Economics Group at Birmingham Business School Professor David Bailey, who gave a presentation about the UK economy.
Professor Bailey highlighted the numerous shocks that the country has faced over the past decade that puts the country in unchartered territory, compounded with recent geopolitical events, such as the US imposition of tariffs, which has created great uncertainty. Data suggests the UK economy is clearly not performing as well as it might had it followed trends from more predictable and favourable times in recent history.
He was followed by BPF Membership Services Director Stephen Hunt, who dived into the detail about the sentiment of the UK plastics industry, using the BPF’s biannual Business Conditions Survey, which had only closed days before the event. Hunt explained the investment and hiring intentions of the wider plastics industry, how it felt about future profitability, as well as feelings about the current UK government. The full data, supplied by almost 100 companies from across the plastics supply chain, is available to BPF members.
The final presentation was given by Bank of England Deputy Agent, West Midlands and Oxfordshire, Glynn Jones. He explained in detail the many factors the Bank has to take into account, including consultation with industry, when making its economic forecasts and decisions about interest rates, as well as the various assumptions that need to be made during this process. He provided a very comprehensive overview of the challenges facing the UK economy, which chimed with the macro-level data from Professor Bailey and the sector-specific data from Hunt.
Wrapping up the event, Law explained that with the weight of economic circumstances and legislative issues the industry faces, it is important for the industry to mobilise Members of Parliament, many of which have proved happy to attend BPF parliamentary events in the past, when members have invited them. The next one is scheduled to take place in March 2026.
Law explained that more than half of the MPs elected last year are new to parliament and have little or no industrial contact or experience. He called upon BPF members to reach out to them, invite them to their plants, or to visit them in their constituency offices. Creating a dialogue with them and educating them about the issues the plastic industry faces is key to ensuring the industry’s voice is heard, Law argued, and the BPF was happy to provide support and even attend meetings, if requested.
Commenting on the event, BPF Director General Philip Law stated:
I am very happy with how our second Meetings Day turned out. We had over 70 senior industry figures attending the dinner, and a great many more attending the following day. I also thank our sponsors of the lunch for helping to make it a success: Sierra 57 Consult and Listgrove.
This event really highlights what makes the BPF such a strong trade association. We brought together a great many senior industry figures to discuss top-level issues and sector-specific issues, to take part in amazing cross-sector networking, all during a thoroughly pleasant event, despite the seriousness of the issues we were discussing.
Feedback from the afternoon was very positive, with a great many BPF staff reporting that members found the event highly useful.
BPF members keen to attend next year are encouraged to get in touch with their group executive, who will be able to provide ‘save the date’ information until registration opens next year.
This annual event is exclusive to BPF members and should not to be missed!
What BPF members said...
"Thank you BPF for organising the meeting today, it was excellent and I thoroughly enjoyed the content of both the packaging group and plenary sessions. Keep up the good work." James Lee, Chairman, Cromwell Polytene Ltd
"I thoroughly enjoyed the Meetings Day yesterday, good and topical presentations all delivered by very engaging presenters. Very well organised and attended, looking forward to next year!" Darren Herron, Sales Director, Mouldshop
"Earlier this week, John hardwick and Karl Edwin attended the British Plastics Federation Group Meetings day in Nottingham. The day consisted of multiple roundtable discussions, followed by lunch and an afternoon plenary session delivered by top speakers within the industry. It was great to catch up with familiar faces!" InTouch Monitoring
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