Major merchants Ball & Doggett, Direct Paper and the Lamson Group are raising their paper prices, rounding off a year that has seen all the big suppliers raise prices.
However, Ball & Doggett’s rise will not come into effect until February, with increases from 6-10 per cent across paper and board. Speciality papers, cutsize copy papers, synthetic sheets and reels, self-adhesive sheets, and rigid media will be at the lower end of the raises, with increases of around six per cent, while packaging boards may rise by 9 per cent and industrial packaging grades of between 5-10 per cent.
Direct Paper is seeking to achieve a price rise for February of between 6-8 per cent. The rise will be across the range including coated paper, uncoated paper, specialty papers, packaging boards, tissue papers, and self-adhesive paper.
Sappi is raising its prices in December, Spicers has yet to make an announcement for the new year, but has raised prices twice this year, in April and July. Ball & Doggett did not raise prices mid-year as its focus was on its merger.
In explaining Q4 price rises, Lamson Paragon points to a colour former chemical (ODB2) shortage, with the Chinese manufacturer supplying 30-35 percent of the world’s supply closed for environmental reasons by the Chinese Government.
Rodney Frost, CEO, Lamson Paragon Group, says, “Huge paper producer Appvion USA (formerly known as Appleton) has gone into Chapter 11, with listed assets in the range of US$100m-US$500m and liabilities in the range of US$500m-$1bn, the Delaware bankruptcy court filing showed.
“The above factors have led to higher prices for Q4 2017 to Q1 2018 with the possibility of not receiving orders/shipments on time, even though confirmation has been given by the mills.
“Do expect price increases of approximately 10 per cent and if Appvion fails to recover, this will inevitably lead to a further reduction/shortage of 6,000 to 8,000 metric tons per month which will cause further price increases.
“For wood-free papers, pulp price has gone up by USD$100 per metric ton in the past two months. Prices are expected to remain higher until Q1 2018.
“Carbonless has also affected by rising pulp prices. As such, we do expect prices to remain higher and will continue to increase in Q4 2017. Idem Papers closed in the first half of this year which took 150,000 tonnes out of the global market.”
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