Finnish paper manufacturer Stora Enso is to sell its German paper production site in Maxau to Schwarz Produktion for around 210 million euros. Schwarz Produktion is the production division of the German Schwarz Group, owner of the retail chains Lidl and Kaufland.
Schwarz Produktion, with more than 4,500 employees, produces and packages mineral water, soft drinks, chocolate, dried fruit, pastries, coffee and ice cream for these retail chains. It also includes three plastic bottle and recycling plants. The Maxau plant will be its first paper manufacturing site.
Stora Enso's Maxau site has a production capacity of 530,000 tons of supercalendered (SC) paper and in 2021 achieved approximately 250 million euros in sales.
Schwarz Produktion would become the owner of the paper mill early next year. The company plans to continue paper production at the site, and keep the 440 employees, Stora Enso said in its release.
The Finnish giant currently has five paper production sites with around 2,300 employees. Last March, it announced its intention to divest four of its five paper mills to focus on renewable products in packaging, building solutions and new biomaterials.
The three other sites it wants to sell - Anjala in Finland and Hylte and Nymölla in Sweden - are still looking for a buyer. For the fifth site - the Belgian paper mill at Langerbrugge - a study is underway to verify the feasibility of converting one of the two paper lines into a board line.
Stora Enso's paper division currently employs about 2,300 people. And for the year 2021, its turnover amounted to 1,703 million euros.
