Rotocast #33 | Is your company prepared for the resin crisis? — LIVE

What you gain by watching

• You learn to map the cash leaks that the crisis exposes: inventory, part weight, scrap, maintenance, and ICMS.
• You see how to use recycled material and negotiate with the customer to hold price without stopping production.
• You come away with a path to involve the team, train operators, and seek specialized help before the problem dooms the batch.

Episode chapters

1. 1

   The resin crisis has arrived: what to do before material runs out at your factory

   The resin crisis is leaving a lot of people on edge: shortages, endlessly rising prices, and pressure that is already knocking on the door of anyone who transforms plastic. We talked to customers in several regions and showed the paths to minimize the impact on your process before the crisis passes — because it will pass, and whoever tightens their belt at the right time comes out ahead.

   And today, folks, we have a very controversial topic here, it's a topic that's leaving a lot of people with white hair, with their hair standing on end or even without hair, right, some cases out there, which is this so-called crisis of-of-of, of the resins

   ▶ Watch at approximately 6:16
2. 2

   Adaptation is mandatory, survival is optional

   Selling lunch to buy dinner and with the crisis hitting every segment of plastics, we faced the question nobody wants to hear: how do you survive when resin disappears and cash gets tight? We talked about companies that got ahead of it and bought giant batches, leaving the small ones empty-handed, and about the way out that involves looking at your own navel — investing in training, trimming down the operation, and truly involving the team. Because in the end the math is clear: adaptation is mandatory, survival is optional.

   Adaptation is mandatory, survival is optional.

   ▶ Watch at approximately 12:00
3. 3

   Rejected by five companies because of salary: the story that brought us here

   We tell the real story of someone who was rejected by five companies for not accepting work for half of what they used to earn — and, after moving cities and facing a period we describe as terrible, found in the crisis an opportunity to be exactly where they are today. It is also a reminder that no crisis is only a threat: the pandemic forced everyone to reinvent themselves, created a hiring boom in IT that turned into a bubble and, when it burst, brought heavy layoffs — and maybe that is exactly what Brazilian plastics and rotomolding are going through now, with the recycling decree demanding a new positioning from every company.

   ▶ Watch at approximately 17:09
4. 4

   The law that mandates recycled material in rotomolding and the resin that vanished from the market

   While many companies still think everything is working and see no reason to change, legislation already mandates the use of recycled material — and those who left it to adapt at the last minute are discovering that the resin simply isn't available anymore, with prices jumping from twelve seventy to eighteen reais in a matter of days. The way out we share here starts before any purchase: stop, look at where your company stands, assess inventory, production and positioning until you find balance — that enduring profit that keeps the operation alive during a crisis, without laying anyone off or hitting rock bottom.

   ▶ Watch at approximately 22:10
5. 5

   When seasonality tightens, diversifying is about surviving

   We know that the crunch here in rotomolding often doesn't come from the product, but from the lack of time to look at the business as a whole — and that's where we ask: what can be improved in the material, the mold, the process? We share the case of clients who gave up on rotomolding because they didn't look for alternatives, while others took advantage of seasonal windows like masks during the pandemic or wind banner molds in an election year; the way out is to stop, map where you are, involve people and seek help, because rotomolding is still a giant market to be explored.

   Either you get up and face the market or you sit down and cry.

   ▶ Watch at approximately 27:13
6. 6

   When the entire factory rallies together to keep its doors open

   What if everyone in the company knew that tomorrow could be the last day? That's what happened in a factory that was losing money within a group with four units — the president announced that he would shut down that factory floor and send 380 people to the streets if it didn't get out of the red within a year. The response came from the bottom up: the employees themselves led an expense containment effort that went as far as picking up coffee cups left on the dusty floor, and the unit not only got out of the red but also helped cover the costs of the group's other factories during seasonality — because a company is an organism, gears of the same mechanism, and no one throws away a bolt by chance.

   People saw that they really were on the street, they decided to do an expense containment, but that came from the employees, it was the factory floor

   ▶ Watch at approximately 32:28
7. 7

   The fat in the price that holds your production until the inevitable pass-through

   When raw material spikes, the metallic zipper may even affect the product, but a factory doesn't stop because of it — that's where the so-called fat in the price comes in, a margin for maneuver that doesn't always last. There comes a time when holding that cost becomes impossible and the pass-through goes to the customer, because the entire segment rises together and everyone understands; the path is to seek partners who can see invisible cash leaks, like the more than seventy thousand reais in taxes that CX Contábil recovered in 2025 alone for a client who didn't even know that credit existed.

   Seventy thousand reais that he didn't know existed, that went straight back into his cash flow

   ▶ Watch at approximately 37:59
8. 8

   ICMS: the tax you pay without realizing it and may be losing

   Many companies buy raw material from another state, pay the ICMS difference and don't even imagine they may have a credit to be reimbursed — and the case becomes even clearer when we see businesses buying through the headquarters when the branch would be cheaper. That's why we hammered the point of sitting down with the accountant and reviewing every cost down to the penny, because an accountant can make your company grow or sink, and it's that case-by-case analysis that reveals where the money is that you leave on the table without realizing.

   An, an accountant, he either makes your company grow or he sinks you

   ▶ Watch at approximately 43:14
9. 9

   What is your little cow? The crisis that drives growth

   When the squeeze hits and the freight bill seems to swallow the 50% savings on the product, the way out is to seek information from those who can guide you — whether it's the Portal, the CX people or your own accountant — and face the crisis in the best possible way. That's where the little cow parable comes in: the wise man pushes the animal off the cliff so that the family stops depending on a single source of income, and years later discovers that that tragedy turned into prosperity. The lesson that remains is to map the process, see losses as indirect cost and understand that rotomolding doesn't have normal loss — it has acceptable loss, and you need to know how to tell the difference.

   What is your little cow, right? Have you mapped your entire process, do you know where your money is going.

   ▶ Watch at approximately 48:16
10. 10

    The invisible cost that devours your profit without you noticing

    The routine suffocates: with no time or knowledge, maintenance gets postponed and the loss hides in every lost cycle, every can of WD40 used instead of the right grease, every 200 kg scorch taken out of the oven. That was when we showed the real case of a factory where we were guiding the team, involving the people at the machine and making maintenance round — because it's no use just putting out fires if the employee doesn't understand the reason behind each adjustment.

    It's no use, if you don't involve your employee who is right in front of you, he won't think about whether he's doing it right or not

    ▶ Watch at approximately 53:54
11. 11

    The kilo of resin you throw in the trash can cost more than you imagine

    Have you ever stopped to measure the actual thickness of your part — or do you trust that the machine is doing everything right? We cut parts, measured with a caliper point by point and showed how simple adjustments to the mold, like an insulation plate or a bit of paint to draw temperature, can reduce weight and cost without changing equipment. And we also talked about scrap: separating flash from sweepings and from parts makes all the difference, because material mixed with sand and floor dust has no one willing to recover it — and that's where the money goes down the drain every month.

    It's just twenty reais just out of laziness that you're doing this

    ▶ Watch at approximately 58:59
12. 12

    The half-meter mold that spat out ten millimeters of waste

    Have you ever stopped to think about how much material goes away without anyone noticing? On a technical visit, we found a company that outsourced its own molds and got back caps with ten millimeters of thickness — absurd for a 450-millimeter opening. They cut off the flash and discarded everything, without reusing anything. We showed that that material was first burn, all it needed was grinding and sending straight to the extruder. In another case, a simple Teflon plate reduced the flash from 700 to less than 100 grams per part, with immediate savings on 24 daily parts per mold.

    It's just so you have an idea of the waste. […] So think carefully about the loss that this company was having, that wasn't analyzing this.

    ▶ Watch at approximately 1:04:06
13. 13

    Without virgin resin, the way out may be recycled — and the customer needs to see it

    With virgin resin seeing increases of 50 to 60% and scarcity forcing even advance payment, the question that never leaves the factory floor is how to keep production going without passing everything on to the customer. The answer we brought is practical: take a test part in recycled material, show your customer the two options — the price that stays with a slight shade variation or the heavy adjustment on virgin — and leave the choice in their hands, because a kid just wants to play, not check whether the pink is exactly the same.

    A kid doesn't care whether the thing is pink, whether it is, whether it's purple or whatever. They want to climb on it, jump, play, and that's it

    ▶ Watch at approximately 1:09:11
14. 14

    Plastic crisis: no doubt needs to become a problem on its own

    In times of crisis, the question that won't go away is how to cut costs without stopping production — and that led us to reaffirm that Portal was born to serve rotomolding, but knows plastics as a whole and knows how to point out the right path for any challenge. We showed that we don't need to master every process: if the doubt is about blow molding, maintenance, or bidding, we bring in specialists and partners who have already connected with the sector even without knowing rotomolding before. The revelation is that laying out the problem for us is, above all, a way to contribute to the whole segment — and at the same time find alternatives to get through the crisis together.

    By talking with companies, we can better understand the situation, we can offer alternatives, and it costs nothing

    ▶ Watch at approximately 1:14:18
15. 15

    An operator without a critical eye can doom the entire batch

    Picture the scenario: a part comes out thin on one side, the operator doesn't measure, doesn't notice, puts it in stock — and only at the shift change or the next day does the problem show up, dooming the whole batch. To keep the loss from spreading, we opened the second class of the Essencial de Rotomolding course: two days, theory and practice at the machine, simulation of real defects and troubleshooting from the start — and, if you prefer, we go to your company to focus on your case.

    It gets to the end of the day, right? So imagine there, a problem happened, right? The operator has no knowledge, has nothing. He saw that the part isn't forming, it's forming thin on one side, right?

    ▶ Watch at approximately 1:19:59