SPE’s Thermoforming Division Bestows Lifetime Achievement on Greg McCunn
The Society of Plastics Engineers (SPE) Thermoforming Division has presented its Lifetime Achievement Award to Greg McCunn, staff engineer for materials at John Deere.
On May 20, at SPE’s Thermoforming Awards Dinner at the Renaissance Atlanta Waverly Hotel in Atlanta, Georgia, the award was given to him by the Division’s Executive Committee. In 1991, Greg McCunn started working in the plastics sector by supplying Jeep with injection molds, which later joined Chrysler. Greg participated in eight Chrysler/Jeep model launches during the following seven years, and the molding facilities grew from a single facility with 29 presses to three factories with 53 presses.
In 1997, Greg moved to John Deere as a quality/manufacturing engineer and joined the styling team “re-skinning” the combine harvester in composites. Later in the buyer role, Greg learned about purchasing and the company’s plastics suppliers. John Deere does not produce plastics and composite-based products, relying on suppliers. Throughout his career, four of Greg’s hand-selected suppliers have won John Deere’s Achieve Excellence Annual Supplier Awards.
In 2000, John Deere initiated strategic sourcing to unify the buying communities between John Deere units and simplify the John Deere supply base. In 2002, Greg joined the strategic sourcing group as a supply base manager for composites. For the next nine years, Greg led decision focus efforts and selected sources for composite styling projects throughout John Deere agriculture factories. The mission consisted of pairing the John Deere project engineer with the appropriate material and process for each application. Materials and processes are supplier-specific, so Greg spent a lot of time on the road visiting potential suppliers and at trade shows learning about processes, suppliers and their capabilities.
In 2011, Greg joined the polymer materials team with the same mission: to align projects with the correct materials, processes and suppliers. Greg has presented at SPE Thermoforming Conferences and the SPE Thermoset Conference. He has been a staff engineer for materials at John Deere for the past 13 years.
“Greg has been instrumental in implementing plastic and composites in John Deere products,” said Paul Uphaus, SPE Thermoforming Division Chair. “He has been a longtime advocate for the thermoforming industry by using the process in his designs, and for that he has our sincere appreciation.”
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