Felix Schoeller Group to spend $100m on North American operations
The German Felix Schoeller Group intends to significantly expand the capacities of its plants in the USA and Canada in three steps from 2023. North American decor paper capacities are expected to more than double over the next three years.
As already announced in August, a new silicone coating system will go into operation at the Pulaski, NY plant in mid-2023 as a first step. This enables Felix Schoeller to supply the North American market with domestically produced siliconized release liners and films.
Focus on expanding decor paper capacities
Other measures to be implemented as part of the project by 2025 include increasing capacity at Technocell Decor’s Drummondville plant in Canada from the current 32,000 t/year to over 40,000 t/year. This expansion is expected to be completed in the fourth quarter of 2023.
The specialty paper manufacturer is also planning to build a second paper machine for the North American market. The new PM will produce up to 50,000 tons of decor paper annually. The location and technical equipment details are to be determined as part of the project planning. Felix Schoeller wants to make further targeted investments in North America in order to be able to produce release liner base papers locally in the USA. The total investment volume for the production of decor and release papers in the USA and Canada is expected to exceed 100 million US dollars.
Hans-Christoph Gallenkamp, CEO of the Felix Schoeller Group, explains that the North American decorative paper market has shown consistently good growth and will continue to grow in the coming years due to the country’s population growth, the resulting demand for housing and the resulting demand for housing including the associated investments in the wood-based materials industry.
With 122 employees at a total of 13 processing and packaging machines, the plant in Pulaski is Felix Schoeller’s main sales location for North America. The group also operates a 30,000 t/year decor paper mill in Drummondville, Canada, and a paper and foil converting mill in Anaheim, California, USA, with 15 employees.
The product range of the Felix Schoeller Group includes photo and digital printing papers, decorative papers for the furniture and wood industries, release papers, nonwoven wallpapers, sublimation papers and flexible paper composites for packaging. In 2021, the group with more than 3,700 employees produced around 545,000 tons of specialty paper and generated sales of €1.05 billion.
