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WHO DO WE WORK FOR:

BACK TO ABOUT US PAGE THE PEOPLE BEHIND CLEARWATER PAPER  

The United Steelworkers locals 608 & 712 are the employees of Clearwater Paper Corporation.  The mill is located just east of the town of Lewiston, Idaho.  It has been there since the early 1900's when Potlatch started it. Originally Lumber then adding a pulp mill, paper board and then a tissue machine.

In December of 2008 the original company, Potlatch Corporation - or PFI (Potlatch Forests Incorporated) as it was once called for many past decades, spun ''us' off as a stand alone manufacturing business.  'Us' being the Consumer Products & Pulp and Paper manufacturing portion of their wood products empire.  This newly formed business is now known as CLEARWATER PAPER CORPORATION.  Clearwater Paper became its own company at the end of December and posted a $13.6 million profit in its first quarter.

Clearwater Paper made $182 million in its first year as a stand-alone company and was able to restructure debt ahead of schedule it assumed when it separated from Potlatch Corp. at the end of 2008.

Potlatch otherwise kept all the other lumber mills and Plywood/OSB plants along with their Timber-land holdings.

CLEARWATER PAPER CORPORATION employees roughly 1,100 Local 608 & 712 members in its Consumer Products (Tissue) P&P works in Lewiston as well as about 400 IAM workers in its Wood Products Mill at this site which is WWPA issue number 52.

Consumer Products (Tissue)

The consumer products segment manufactures and sells household tissues, including paper towels, napkins, bathroom tissue and facial tissue. It produces over half of the store-brand, household tissues sold in grocery stores in the United States.

The consumer products division produces through-air-dried (TAD) paper towels, as well as premium and value brand towels. It makes napkins in ultra, two-ply and three-ply dinner napkins, plus value one-ply luncheon napkins. The bathroom tissue produced is mostly two-ply ultra, though other types are manufactured and sold. The facial tissues produced by the division include ultra lotion facial tissues. Clearwater primarily produces ultra and premium qualities of the tissue it produces, though it does manufacture lower grades as well.

The division has three Tissue Paper machines and Tissue converting at the company's facilities in Lewiston, Idaho, one Tissue machine and converting plant at the Las Vegas facility in Nevada as well as a Tissue converting facility in Elwood, IL. And a facility with under construction in North Carolina.  The total cost for the new facility is expected to be approximately $260 to $280 million, which includes the two new converting lines previously announced in February 2010. The total cost figure includes the paper machine, seven converting lines, buildings to house the paper machine and converting lines and land. The company expects to fund the project primarily with existing cash on the balance sheet and future cash flow from operations. It is expected that capital will be deployed over the next five years, with approximately 80 percent to be split evenly between 2011 and 2012

Pulp and Paperboard

The company's pulp and paperboard segment manufactures bleached paperboard, primarily for the packaging industry, as well as solid bleach sulfate (SBS) paperboard. SBS board is a type of paperboard that is used in the production of folding cartons, liquid packaging, plates, cups and some commercial printing applications.

The pulp and paperboard segment also produces softwood market pulp, which is used as the primary raw material in the production of a wide variety of paper products, and slush pulp (excess or waste pulp), which it sends to the consumer products segment. To make pulp for the manufacture of all its products, the division uses several species of pine and fir trees, as well as high-quality cedar products[3]The Pulp and Paper portion of this mix includes not only the Pulp Mill and two Paper Board machine here in Lewiston and a Pulp Mill, Paper Board machine and Paper Board plant in Crosset, AK.  It markets the brands Ancora and Candesce.

Wood Products

The wood products segment mainly manufactures appearance grade cedar and dimensional framing lumber products. It's cedar products include appearance grade boards, siding and trim, and the dimensional lumber it produces include both glued and profile lumber, used for two-inch dimensional framing, industrial timbers and railroad ties.

On September 17th , 2010

Clearwater Paper Corp. announced that it acquired Cellu Tissue Holdings Inc. a 10 site corporation with various type tissue machines and converting machines that produce many products from consumer tissue products, food industry wrapping, hospital support tissue products to foam picnic plates.  So it may expand into markets not yet tried.  More on that as information is received.