South Carolina Business Review

Sustainable packaging efforts being led by Clemson

By Mike Switzer

Published September 25, 2025 at 6:30 AM EDT

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James Sternberg, Assistant Professor of sustainable packaging at Clemson University

Our next guest’s upstate university recently awarded $2.5 million in grants to support the development of cutting-edge sustainable packaging solutions that they say will help develop new packaging technologies to meet new European and Canadian regulations, and thus help keep export markets open for specialty crop producers in our state and the nation. Mike Switzer interviews James Sternberg, with the Sustainable Packaging Innovation Lab at Clemson University.

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Mike Switzer

After almost 20 years, Mike Switzer retired from Wells Fargo Securities in 2001 as Senior Vice President/Investment Officer and Certified Portfolio Manager. In 1999, he and his wife, Maggie, purchased and operated for eight years the Baskin Robbins ice cream store on Forest Drive in Columbia. They grew the store from a bottom-tier operation in the Baskin Robbins franchise system to one in the top 5% nationwide within three years, tripling sales along the way. While operating the ice cream store, Mike and Maggie received patents for a portable ice cream sink and fold-down sneezeguard they invented and in 2002 started Magnolia Carts, an ice cream cart manufacturing company, which they sold in 2013.

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