Plastic manufacturers have had a wild ride enduring one resin price increase after another. Many plastic manufacturers have had little choice but to pass at least some of these price increases along to their customers' or suffer eroding profit margins.
 
Resin prices have gone up because of an increase in crude oil. Crude oil is the feed stock that is used to make plastic resins.  The price of crude oil and the price of resin are directly linked.  A complete explanation for the rise in crude oil goes beyond the scope of this article. Suffice it to say that factors such as exchange rates, supply and demand, political climate and terrorism factor into the equation. Resin prices  are even more difficult to predict because they are the second derivative of crude oil. Thermoplastic resins only account for  4% of petroleum based products. This makes the market for thermoplastic resins less important than gasoline or heating oil, which accounts for 70% of crude oil production.
 
You may  have you heard from a plastics supplier that prices are going up because of crude oil? Have you ever gotten a call announcing price decreases because crude oil prices have declined? I have not and you probably haven't either.  Fortunately  there are things you can do to  keep your cost for molded parts in check:

 

 

 

 

Anyone that buys parts that are made of plastic should be talking to their supplier about forecasting how the likely increase in raw materials may affect the plastic parts costs. Don't limit yourself to recommendations in this article. A collaboration with your supplier can lead to an infinite amount of possibilities to reduce cost and even improve quality at the same time.