Jim,

I read your letter last month with great interest, in that I have done a lot of work with Mother Mining over the years.  I think the situation is even more strange than you outline.  3M intentionally designs their products – and equipment – to use the cheapest paper they can buy.  I personally have suggested a number of times that they look into specialty paper manufactured to purpose that would eliminate processing problems (and, I think, reduce overall costs) with no success.  It makes for more engineering but not necessarily best cost/benefit.

The problem, I think, is that paper companies don’t see 3M as a big consumer.  Sure, they make a lot of Post-It’s – but they are made on only a few moderate speed specialty coating machines and then converted using the simplest of converting equipment.  Relatively, only a small tonnage is converted.  So a paper mill does not see them as worth too much effort.

Another way to look at them would be in a partnership mode where paper would be manufactured to specific, tight tolerances & specifications (like IBM punch cards were back in ancient times), where the mill makes a fair profit and supports the product when changes or new product ideas come up.  I doubt that most mills would make that effort.  Wausau could have been a good supplier, for example, but now the Brokaw mill is shut down…

Thought you might be interested in this perspective.

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