Thanks to the Power of the Internet, This Green Company's Booming

Dennis and Lenora Salazar of Plainfield believe in “less is more,” thinking inside the box and just saying no to the packing peanut.

With 50 years combined experience in the packaging industry, the Salazars are making a name for themselves with innovative thinking and pioneering earth-friendly alternatives to standard packaging products.

“Packaging is in our blood,” Dennis Salazar said.

A Chicago native, he and his wife Lenora Salazar, a Navy brat born in Spain, met in the packaging industry, married and moved to Plainfield 11 years ago, and launched their own green packaging company, Salazar Packaging Inc., four years ago.

“I told my wife, ‘If I’m going to start another company, I’d like it to be for us,’” said Dennis Salazar, who had started packaging companies and divisions for others during his career. “We quit our nice two cushy jobs. Within six months we realized green was booming and we had an opportunity to make a difference in the environment and industry. A lot of the products the market wanted hadn’t been invented yet.”

Salazar Packaging Inc., based in a 12,500-square-foot facility at 12351 S. Industrial Drive East in Plainfield, specializes in sustainable packaging and packaging automation. The company helps businesses reduce packaging waste and use environmentally friendly packaging products.

Salazar Packaging’s own brand of green packaging products, Globe Guard, and an online store (www.globeguardproducts.com) have led to a customer base of hundreds, Salazar said. Customers range from Volcano Island Honey Co., a small manufacturer of Hawaiian organic honey, to name brands such as Stonyfield Farms and Method.

Products include the Globe Guard Cooler, a green alternative to Styrofoam coolers for picnics and tailgating, and popular Globe Guard corrugated boxes made from 100 percent recycled content, compared to typical 25 percent to 35 percent.

The recyclable Globe Guard Air Fill, an inflatable bag made from 100-percent recycled plastic that replaces packing peanuts or other typical box filler, exemplifies the company’s focus on secondary packaging, the packaging inside the packaging.

The Salazars hope to unveil the latest Globe Guard product by Earth Day.

“Our goal is to be where people can pick up a Globe Guard product and know it’s green,” said Salazar, adding 95 percent of his company’s products are green. “Similar products are on the market. The difference is all of ours have a green story. They’re recycled or biodegradable.”

In October, Green America’s Green Business Network named Salazar Packaging, Inc. its preferred supplier of packaging materials.

In March, most of the Globe Guard products were approved by the Delta Institute for inclusion in the consumer advisory organization’s Buying Better Web site.

Salazar Packaging, a Minority Business Enterprise and privately owned company, sells other products such as paper mailers, labels, biodegradable bubble wrap and stretch films. Beyond product sales, Salazar also provides packaging automation for shrink wrapping and bundling, vertical packaging, automatic bagging and more.

Dennis Salazar serves as president and oversees marketing, sales and design while Lenora Salazar, vice president, focuses on sales, operations and accounting.

They have just a two-mile commute and drive a hybrid car, actions in line with being “eco-consistent,” a phrase Dennis Salazar said he coined a few years ago while tuning in to the growing acceptance of green products and the power of social media.

His first-ever blogpost helped jumpstart the company. Titled “Am I retrainable for sustainable?” on the blog “Sustainable Is Good,” Salazar’s blogpost was picked up by Reuters and such Web sites as Greenbiz.com, treehuger.com and packagingdiva.com.

“The story had great legs and was posted and reposted,” Salazar said. “Our phones started ringing. That’s when we realized the tremendous power of the Internet.”

Salazar began to post on more blogs and hired a marketing professional to create his own blog, “Inside Sustainable Packaging,” and a cartoon character called Eco-Ed that was picked up by Packaging World magazine.

Salazar’s continued use of social media, from blogs to podcasts, has helped establish the couple’s company from coast to coast.

“The initial plan was to create a typical packaging company like the ones we worked for our whole lives,” he said. “We changed focus when we went down the green path. If you’ve been around long enough, you know green has come and gone a few times. We concluded green is here to stay.”