The Recycler Who Couldn't Sell

Thomas had spent four years building something remarkable. His company collected plastic waste from coastal communities in Southeast Asia, processed it into post-consumer recycled pellets, and supplied it to manufacturers who needed to meet incoming recycled content requirements. The quality was there. The traceability was there. The certification was there.

The timing was perfect, too. The EU Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation was moving through final approval. Every major FMCG operating in Europe would need to introduce recycled content into their packaging — up to 60% by 2030 in certain categories. There was no shortage of demand. Sustainability managers at Unilever, L'Oréal, and a dozen other companies had taken his call, asked for samples, and said, in different ways, the same thing: "This is exactly what we need."

And then nothing happened.

The conversations didn't die — they just stopped moving. Follow-up emails were met with out-of-office replies, then forwarded to someone in procurement, then to someone in operations, then to a cross-functional working group that met quarterly. A request for a formal proposal arrived five months after the initial meeting — formatted in a supplier intake template that Thomas had never seen before and did not know how to fill in correctly.

Thomas understood why his product mattered. He did not understand how large companies bought things. His team was composed of environmental engineers, logistics coordinators, and community development managers. Nobody had ever navigated a Tier-1 FMCG procurement process. Nobody knew that the sustainability manager who wanted the product was not the person who could approve it. Nobody knew that "this is exactly what we need" was the beginning of a process, not the end of one.

He tried to hire a sales director with FMCG experience. The first two candidates asked for a base salary he couldn't justify against a pipeline that hadn't closed yet. The third took the role and left after six months, citing a mismatch between what the company did and what large clients expected.

Meanwhile, the regulatory deadline was getting closer. The FMCG companies were getting more serious. And Thomas watched as two competitors — with inferior products, worse traceability, and no community impact story — closed supply agreements while his pipeline of warm, interested contacts went nowhere.

He had the right product at the right moment. What he didn't have was the commercial bridge to cross from environmental credibility to commercial reality.

What keeps Thomas awake:

• Real interest from major FMCG companies that never converts — conversations die in procurement
• No knowledge of how FMCG buying decisions actually work: who approves, who signs, what format is required
• A competitor with a weaker product closing deals Thomas can't close
• A regulatory window that is tightening — and a pipeline that is not moving fast enough
• The risk that by the time the internal commercial capability is built, the best partnerships will already be taken