Kruger Products

Kruger Products LP

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Type	Public
Traded as	TSX: KPT
Founded	1923 (1923)
Headquarters	Mississauga, ON, Canada
Area served	Canada, USA, Mexico
Key people	Mario Gosselin (Director and chief executive officer) Mark Holbrook (chief financial officer) Wendy Kelley (Corporate Secretary and General Counsel)
Products	Tissue, paper towels, napkins, washroom dispensers
Brands	Cashmere®, Scotties®', Purex®, White Swan®, SpongeTowels®, Embassy®, Embassy®, Esteem®
Revenue	CA$955.3 million (2013)
Operating income	CA$80.2 million (2013)
Total assets	CA$165.5 million (2013)
Number of employees	2,400 (2013)
Website	www.krugerproducts.ca

Kruger Products LP, formerly Scott Paper Limited, is a Canadian manufacturer and distributor of tissue, towel and napkin products for consumer in-home use and for commercial away-from-home use. Formerly a majority-owned subsidiary of Scott Paper Company, it was acquired by Kruger Inc. of Montreal, Quebec, in 1997 following Scott's merger with Kimberly-Clark.

Kruger Products is based in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, and has manufacturing operations in Canada (New Westminster, British Columbia; Crabtree, Sherbrooke, Gatineau, Quebec; Toronto, Trenton, Ontario) and the United States (Memphis, Tennessee) with an annual paper making capacity of 363,000 metric tonnes and more than 2,400 employees.

At the end of 2013, Kruger Products was 84.32% owned by Kruger and 15.68% owned by KP Tissue Inc. (TSX: KPT), which was incorporated in 2012 for the purpose to acquire, and its business is limited to holding a limited partnership interest in Kruger Products.

History

In January 2013, Kruger Products started producing bathroom tissue on a new $316 Million Through-Air Dried tissue paper making machine at its Memphis, Tennessee plant, the largest industrial building in the state of Tennessee.

In 2014, Kruger Products completed the acquisition of Metro Paper Industries Inc.'s Canadian tissue assets and Metro's entire North American Away-From-Home (AFH) customer base.

Products

Canadian Consumer Products

Sold through grocery, drug, mass merchandisers, club, dollar, convenience and online retailers:

• Cashmere bathroom tissue (formerly Cottonelle); as well as Cashmere Fresh Wipes and Cashmere napkins
• Purex bathroom tissue (Western Canada only)
• SpongeTowels paper towels (formerly ScotTowels)
• Scotties facial tissue (Note: Irving Tissue owns the U.S. licence)
• EnviroCare family of products made from 100 per cent recycled fibre include Cashmere EnviroCare, Purex EnviroCare, Scotties EnviroCare and SpongeTowels EnviroCare. These products are EcoLogo-certified as well as FSC(R)-certified
• White Swan napkins, bathroom tissue, paper towels and facial tissue
• Soft & Pure bathroom tissue (Western Canada only)

U.S. & Mexico Consumer Products

• White Cloud bathroom tissue, paper towel, facial tissue. White Cloud Green Earth bathroom tissue and paper towels are made from 100 per cent recycled fibres and are EcoLogo-certified as well as FSC(R)-certified.

Away From Home Products

Bathroom tissue, facial tissue, paper towel, paper napkin, wiper, hand care and dispensing systems for commercial and industrial use in food service, property management, healthcare, manufacturing, education and lodging segments.

Operations

• Mississauga, Ontario: Corporate Headquarters
• Toronto, Ontario: Converting (formerly Metro Paper Industries Inc.)
• Trenton, Ontario: Converting (formerly Metro Paper Industries Inc.)
• Crabtree, Quebec: Deinking, Pulping, Papermaking (73,000 MT) and Converting of bathroom tissue and paper towels
• Sherbrooke, Quebec: Papermaking (24,000 MT)
• Gatineau, Quebec: Papermaking (91,000 MT) and Converting of bathroom tissue, facial tissue, paper towels and napkins
• New Westminster, British Columbia: Papermaking (58,000 MT) and Converting of bathroom tissue, facial tissue and paper towels
• Memphis, Tennessee: Papermaking (117,000 MT) and Converting of bathroom tissue, facial tissue and paper towels

Sustainability

In 2010 Kruger Products established Sustainability 2015, a five-year sustainable development initiative to reduce its environmental impact. Sustainability 2015 includes nine quantifiable targets based on 2009 baseline metrics in key areas, including fibre, energy, emissions, water, product offering, packaging and transport.

Includes:

• Installation of a biogasification system at its New Westminster, British Columbia plant which has reduced greenhouse gas emissions by over 50 per cent since 2009. The system heats wood waste destined for landfill to create a syngas which replaces 445,000 metric tonnes of natural gas.
• Installation of a heat recovery system at its Gatineau, Quebec plant. The system has reduced the plant's energy by 10 per cent and its green house gas emissions by 13 per cent. An additional heat recovery system was recently installed at its Crabtree, Quebec plant and is expected to reduce energy consumption at the facility by six per cent and greenhouse gas emissions by nine per cent.
• First Canadian tissue manufacturer to become Forest Stewardship Council(R) chain-of-custody certified. Rainforest Alliance provides annual audits for maintaining certification.

Corporate Social Responsibility

Kruger Products philanthropic endeavors focused on cancer research, children's health and conservation:

• Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation sponsor since 2005
• Ronald McDonald House Charities Canada for over 25 years, donating household paper products to all houses across Canada
• Children's Miracle Network Hospitals in the U.S. since 2013 through the White Cloud brand
• Friends of We Care for more than a decade, sending children with disabilities to Easter Seals camps
• Nature Canada sponsor since 2006 through the White Swan brand.
• Earth Day Canada partner since 2012 through the EnviroCare brand
• Crohn's and Colitis Canada sponsor since 2014 through the Cashmere and Purex brands

Corporate Sponsorships

• Scotties Tournament of Hearts presenting sponsor since 1982. This sponsorship of the Canadian Women's Curling Championship.
• Rogers Cup presented by National Bank official sponsor since 2013 for the men's and women's tournament played each year in Toronto and Montreal through Tennis Canada with the Cashmere and SpongeTowels EnviroCare brands.
• Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) since 2014 through the Cashmere brand.

Intellectual property

As part of Kruger's purchase of Scott Paper Limited, Kimberly-Clark sold several trademarks originally owned by Scott U.S., such as Tournament of Hearts and Purex, to the Canadian firm, and also allowed the latter to continue to use several other brand names – including Scott, Cottonelle, ScotTowels and Viva – under licence until June 6, 2007, at which time Kimberly-Clark became free to introduce new products under those names in Canada. Beginning in 2004, Kruger was allowed to transition many of the brands in the latter group to other trademarks owned outright by Kruger; accordingly, between 2004 and 2006, Cottonelle was rebranded as Cashmere, and ScotTowels became SpongeTowels. Kimberly-Clark, in turn, launched its own versions of Kleenex Cottonelle toilet paper and Scott paper towels in Canada once the licence agreement expired in 2007.

The Canadian company was also required to change its name once the licensing agreement expired, and adopted the Kruger Products name in the fall of 2006.

Under a separate but related agreement, the "Scotties" brand has been licensed to Kruger until at least 2021, with options to renew for successive 25-year terms; Kimberly-Clark already owned the competing Kleenex brand and presumably would have no need to reclaim this trademark. This allowed Kruger to continue its sponsorship of Canada's women's curling championship, formerly the Scott Tournament of Hearts, under a slightly modified title beginning in 2007: the Scotties Tournament of Hearts. Kruger Products' sponsorship is the longest in Canadian amateur athletics.

External links

• Official website