February 22, 2013
Wausau Paper announced the closure of the company’s technical specialty paper mill in Brainerd, Minnesota, US to occur early in the second quarter of 2013. The closure will affect approximately 130 employees.
The Company recently announced its intent to strategically reposition the company to focus on its Tissue business. A range of alternatives for the divestiture of the technical specialty business have been explored. It has become clear that Brainerd will not contribute to those alternatives and the closure will significantly improve the continuing Paper segment operating results.
Hank Newell, President and CEO commented on the closure, “A number of factors, including our accelerated exit from the print business, protracted global economic weakness and recent competitive paper capacity additions in Asia have impacted the viability of the Brainerd operations and created operational losses from the mill that were unsustainable.”