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Keep Track of your Cap with Keepy Cap

Introduction

Our company, 3M, has been changing the world for over a century. Our mission is to use science to improve lives and help solve the world's toughest challenges while remaining focused on executing plans and continuing to deliver exceptional value for our customers and premium returns for our shareholders (3M, n.d.). As a business committed to sustainability by reducing carbon emissions and combatting climate change, 3M collaborates with the United Nations Climate Change (UNCCC) to take social and environmental responsibility for meeting UN Sustainability Development Goals (3M News Center, 2021). Through its work, 3M continues to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and has pledged to reduce carbon emissions by 50% by 2030 and 80% by 2040 (3M News Center, 2021). Additionally, the promise of embedding sustainability measures in every new product line within 3M sets the stage for this product proposal. The results impact the greater good, demonstrate reusability and recyclability, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and the carbon footprint (3M 2021 Sustainability Report, 2021).

Since the pandemic's start, the public has become more aware of ways that contaminants are transmitted. Individuals are more conscientious of methods to keep themselves safe and healthy, and 3M is committed to efforts to curb the effects of the pandemic and keep the public safe. Under its mission, 3M combined science, innovation, and technology to increase the production of N95 masks in 2020, producing the one billionth N95 mask shipped to healthcare and essential workers on the frontlines during the pandemic (3M Stories, 2021; 3M 2021 Sustainability Report, 2021). This feat would have taken four years in the pre-pandemic period, but 3M stepped up to its mission to supply the much-needed PPE (3M Stories, 2021). Additionally, in 2020, 3M launched the production of reusable face masks, reusable respirators, and hand sanitizer that is now available in nine countries (3M 2021 Sustainability Report, 2021). The efforts of 3M illustrate the basis for the new product development in the form of an adhesive agent that bonds bottle caps to single-use plastic and aluminum bottles with screw caps, called the Keepy Cap.

Product

The Keepy Cap is a bonding agent applied to the exterior surface of the lid/cap. When unscrewed, the cap can be adhered to the bottle and will not roll away and land in an undesirable place, becoming contaminated or lost. The Keepy Cap is a contact flexible adhesive manufactured, packaged, and distributed by 3M through its Safety & Industrial group. The Keepy Cap adhesive will be manufactured at the Greenville, South Carolina Industrial Adhesives and Tapes Division tape plant (3M Plant Locations, n.d.). As part of the commercial solution industry at 3M, the Keepy Cap is promoted to bottling companies including, but not limited to, Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Molson Coors Brewing Company, and REAL along with their affiliates in bottling, including Atlas Bottling Company in Africa, Carlsberg Breweries in Europe, and COFCO Coca-Cola Beverages Ltd in greater China and Mongolia to name a few (The Coca-Cola Company, n.d.).

The Keepy Cap is a bonding solution for other commercial companies focused on sustainability, reusability, and recycling. The Keepy Cap adhesive is a hand and glove fit given 3Ms long-standing history of good design and next-generation adhesives. The bond generated by the adhesive agent is a new product and brand, added to 3Ms 800 brands with sales in over 200 countries (3M 2021 Sustainability Report, 2021). The Keepy Cap is a scientific solution that meets our beverage company partners and bottling companies' performance needs while engaging the responsible public in environmentally sustainable practices that are eco-friendly. Next, our focus shifts to the target markets for our product.