2015 Safer Choice Partner of the Year Award Winners: Innovators

Profiles for each of the 2015 Safer Choice Partner of the Year Award Winners in the Innovators category have been compiled in order to provide you with a better understanding of why each organization was recognized as an award winner. The winners in the Innovators category are listed below.

• AkzoNobel, Chicago, IL
• Chemlink Laboratories, Kennesaw, GA
• Stepan Company, Northfield, IL

See the listing of all 2015 Safer Choice Partner of the Year Award Winners.

AkzoNobel, Chicago, IL 

AkzoNobel is being recognized as an outstanding Safer Choice Innovator. The company is a global paints and coatings manufacturer and a major producer of specialty chemicals. Safer Choice commends AkzoNobel for its strong external communications and stakeholder involvement efforts, as well as its full-spectrum approach to safer chemicals. For example, in developing a new chelating agent, AkzoNobel not only designed a safer chemical, but collaborated with EPA and others on innovative test methods to confirm the chemical’s safer profile. AkzoNobel is working with the Environmental Defense Fund to publish a case study on this approach.

Chemlink Laboratories, Kennesaw, GA 

Chemlink is being recognized as an outstanding Safer Choice Innovator. The company’s core strength is its ability to develop safer chemical formulations in a compressed tablet form for a variety of applications. Safer Choice commends Chemlink for helping a trade partner with a marketing initiative at Grand Central Station, where Chemlink provided product samples that delivered the Safer Choice message to thousands of commuters. Also, Chemlink incorporates post-consumer waste in its packaging and partnered with Safer Choice to transform a problematic chemistry into a safer alternative.

Stepan Company, Northfield, IL 

Stepan Company is being recognized as an outstanding Safer Choice Innovator. Stepan is a sustainable and global chemical solutions company. They have advanced the use of safer chemicals through their participation in and support of CleanGredients® and by working with customers interested in securing the Safer Choice label. Safer Choice commends Stepan for its development of safer surfactants and promoting the Safer Choice label in its Surfactant Sales Trainee Program (an annual training for incoming college graduates interested in a sales position at the company). Of note, Stepan has listed 30 surfactants on CleanGredients® since 2006.