Jason Lucash and Mike Szymczak Introduce Rupt: Second-Life Packaging, Eco-Friendly, and Answering Distributors' Needs

Last week at the PPAI Expo in Las Vegas, Jason Lucash and Mike Szymczak debuted Rupt, their new supplier venture that specializes in products like electronics, bags, and drinkware, but also revolutionizes the possibilities of packaging through what they call "second-life" packaging.

The Rupt booth was hard to miss, with a neon light and head-to-toe shelves of products. What stood out, though, was the fact that the packaging was shown off the same as a bluetooth speaker or the other 30 products Rupt is hitting the market with.

That's because that "second-life" packaging is meant to last long after the first impression by transforming into a variety of fun products, like bird feeders, desktop organizers, or planters.

It's that eco-friendly mission that's at the heart of what Rupt does, ensuring that all products feature post-consumer recycled materials and adhere to strict environmental standards.

Lucash and Szymczak both came from within the HPG umbrella, having founded Origaudio, which HPG acquired in 2018. Lucash stepped down from his role at HPG in 2022, and since then has been viewing the promo industry from a different viewpoint: He was suddenly outside of the industry, and that gave him valuable insight when forming his new brand.

He noticed what he called a "lack of innovation" at a lot of suppliers, and saw his chance to do something different.

"I saw major gaps in the sector and said, 'I want to come back in and do some things differently and elevate the industry as a whole,'" Lucash says from the Rupt booth at the PPAI Expo. "When I was running Orig, and we were part of HPG before, you were running 100 MPH with blinders. You weren't able to watch it as a outsider. ... It's really interesting. I learned a lot more being out of the industry for the last two years than being in the industry for 10 years."

Szymczak said that it gave them a chance to see where the opportunities were for them to come in and disrupt — hence the name — the industry.

The main area was packaging. That second-life packaging, where the products come in packaging that can live on as other things, is at the very core of what Rupt does. Lucash says he remembers a certain box that housed an Origaudio product being used to hold up computer monitors, and thought it was a missed opportunity to design the product specifically for that use.

"So that's the idea where second-life came from," he says. "We wanted the boxes to serve a purpose once they're done being boxes. ... All of them have unique purposes. So the client, the person receiving it, can actually hold onto it after some specific use."

Lucash said the design process for the packaging was the hardest, but most rewarding part.

"I feel like we nailed it," he says. "We could've had this vessel be a desk organizer across seven pieces of drinkware. But why have that when you could have it turn into different objects like bird feeders or other objects?"

This is also the first time Lucash and Szymczak ventured into the drinkware category. Right now, Rupt has nine different drinkwrae products, all with unique designs that Szymczak says is free from "me-too" or copycatting other big-name retail brands, like the Stanley tumbler, which he calls the "Stumbler."

Lucash and Szymczak's time away, in addition to the relationships they've maintained within the industry, have allowed them to listen to what distributors really want, identify their pain points, and provide something they feel is tailor-made to what the modern distributor, end-buyer, and end-user want in a promotional product.

"Rupt was born out of 10 years of things distributors have been asking us for," Lucash says. "Distributors wanted international distribution to be easy, they wanted second-life packaging, they wanted recycled products, they wanted transparency on the supply chain, carbon neutrality. Those are all things that people have asked us for all over the country for the last 10 years. And now we've just launched it and answered all of their needs with Rupt."