serendipitous alliance

Suzette Mehler's international business, product invention, and manufacturing background, and Jim LeVine, Ph.D.'s environmental economics and scientific background were an unusual alliance that may have been necessary to forge a global producer vision to engage consumers in a way that could change the course of plastic pollution. Suzette worked on the project for seven years, beginning in the Summer of 2014, before making contact with Jim in late 2021. Suzette comes from marketing and Jim from science so they spent hours trying to understand one another--once in a 14 hours phone call! 

Their interdisciplinary and in-depth research revealed a unique perspective on plastic pollution, diverging significantly from conventional industry narratives. They concluded that effective solutions require the participation of most of the global consumer base. More specifically, they identified a "treatable" problem stemming from unsustainable social norms distributed by the marketplace, and propose using the marketplace to influence newly defined safer norms.

The Catalyst: In June 2014, while aboard Captain Charles Moore’s plastic pollution research catamaran, Alguita O.R.V., Suzette saw as many microplastics as tiny swimming creatures in a petri dish, and an indication of possible future plastic in the greater oceans. Her snap instinct was that the global scale of consumers of plastics had overrun government and NGOs, that people don’t want plastic pollution, and that it was a matter of developing and promoting the right call to action (all instincts were spot on). So, she self-initiated and funded a market research study to develop a more effective message. She found prior plastic pollution market research studies were specific to cities, products, and bans, which were among consensus-based media. Suzette's research was different: a high-up, global, corporate, interdisciplinary meta-analysis of what everyone is doing in the plastic pollution field. It resulted in discovering gaps, but more importantly, she discovered a new paradigm to understand how to solve plastic pollution, and applied it to a marketplace solution.

Global Research: Her research scope grew from the U.S. to five continents, realizing the scale of plastic pollution was not regional but planetary. Plastic is distributed globally, used and leaked by nearly 8 billion people on Earth. 

So why can't the great minds in science, economics, and academia stop it? The research indicates leakage should be the focus and people must be engaged to control leakage. But stakeholders address it in long-term, peripheral ways—disruption, regulation, circularity, bans, and downstream cleanup. In other words, stakeholders are trying work-arounds because they do not have the right marketing coordinates. 

An algorithim is born, by synthesizing scientific studies with behavioral and attitudinal studies, she found data anomalies (and value in discarded data) that led to a profound discovery—a pattern in human behavior and attitudes about plastic pollution across the globe. Suzette used these insights to develop a statistical algorithm of behavioral cohorts, a psychographic tool she uses to deconstruct previous plastic pollution public engagement and inform more precise coordinates for designing future marketing efforts. Her research led to human herd behavioral studies by Robert Cialdini, Ph.D., which is when the magic happened. Suzette conclude that humanity must participate in the solution, what they need to do, and a business marketing strategy to carry it out.

Operational Background: Besides possessing extensive knowledge of published studies in plastic pollution, her resume of marketing experience is vertically integrated—an entrepreneur, patented inventor, and offshore manufacturer-importer. 

She uses her research to identify market opportunities and can translate them into new product inventions, informed by her understanding of materials, costs, manufacturing, and import/export logistics.

Global Branding: Suzette spent four years as a supplier to Skechers USA, working directly with a dynamic Vice President of Visual Merchandising. In this role, she was exposed to Skechers' global branding process and supplied containers of branded goods to their Asian manufacturers for distribution to their global markets.

The Foundation: Suzette grew up a block from steep cliffs, thriving tidepools, and a crashing ocean. She said doors closed while others opened in life which created a path to this important work, and an unrelenting drive to prevent animal harm by stopping plastic leakage. Suzette's husband is an engineer, MPA, and works for a public agency involved in waste management, Her daughter is working towards architectural licensure. They live in Long Beach, CA.