Conversations w/ Friends
Candid conversations with the people shaping sustainable industries.
Conversations With Friends: The Founders’ Table with Marty Grohman
What manufacturers should be thinking about as EPR and circularity continue to evolve.
Join us for a conversation with Marty Grohman as we explore how extended producer responsibility (EPR) has evolved from a niche policy concept into an essential business compliance priority for manufacturers in 2026 and beyond. We'll discuss the lessons Marty has learned working across manufacturing, recycling, sustainability, and policy; where he sees the biggest opportunities and challenges ahead; and how initiatives like Buttercup and its new platform (think LEEDuser for all things EPR policy) are helping build more connected and circular systems.
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Marty, the founder of Buttercup EPR and its Discussion Forum, is a longtime advocate for practical, market-based approaches to sustainability. Throughout his career, he has worked across business, environmental innovation, and public policy, helping organizations prepare for what's next.
Past Conversations
The Future of Sustainability Is Connected
Learn how manufacturers, designers, and owners are using data to turn intent into action—and action into results.
Sustainability goals are relatively easy to set. It’s the follow-through—the data, tools, and workflows that turn those goals into daily decisions that’s hard.
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In this Conversations with Friends webinar, we’re tackling one of the biggest challenges facing manufacturers, designers, and owners today: how to make sustainability data actually useful to reduce not only impact but accelerate business value and results.
The ROI of Sustainable Materials
Where specification, manufacturing, and digital strategy meet.
In this conversation, leaders from multiple sides of the table—HOK’s Candon Murphy, Rockfon North America’s Rachel Berkin, and BuildingEase’s Barbra BatShalom—share their career journeys, the pressures and opportunities they are navigating, and how the digital evolution in the built environment’s sustainable materials industry is rewriting the rules. Moderated by Parallel’s Annie Bevan, we’ll explore what’s driving change, what’s next, and what it means for every role in the materials ecosystem.
Humanity First
Putting social health and equity at the heart of building.
In a moment where human well-being, justice, and equity are more critical than ever, this conversation explores how the built environment can—and must—prioritize people. An impact category of the Common Materials Framework, social health and equity underscores the need to center human experience in product manufacturing, decisions, policy, and design. Join industry leaders as they share how they’re putting people first—and where we go from here.
