The Awakening Giant (Routledge Revivals)

8	The Change Strategy Without Political Support: Plastics Division

The story of ICI's interests in plastics dates from the 1930s although ICI Plastics Division was not formed until 1945. The division grew rapidly in the 1950s and 1960s on a host of new products for the construction, motor car, engineering, and packaged food industries and then in the 1970s ran into increasing competition, large rises in raw materials costs, and difficulties with maturing products. Unlike many ICI divisions, Plastics is close to the consumer and much influenced by a 4.3 year cycle of boom and slump. In the 1970s the bad years for the division were 1971 and 1975 and it was expected that the economic recession of 1980 would produce some inauspicious financial ...