History
A SMART Heritage
SMART Papers manufactures and markets premium cast-coated and matte-coated papers at our mill located in Hamilton, Ohio.
Originally the site of the Champion Coated Paper Company, printing paper has been produced at Hamilton by Champion, International Paper and now SMART Papers for over 110 years.
There have been many paper making breakthroughs at our mill over the course of the past century.
In 1929, for example, the cast coating process was invented in Hamilton. This process takes a coated sheet and “casts” it against a hot, very smooth, highly polished drum to produce a high-gloss, ultra-smooth and ink-receptive surface for the highest quality printing. Even today, only a few mills around the world deploy this technology.
Over 50 years ago, we installed specialized equipment to reclaim fiber from coated paper waste. Today, we are one of the largest users of coated paper waste that would otherwise be land-filled.
And 25 years ago, we produced the first 100% Recycled Premium Text and Cover paper brand; today we use recycled fiber throughout our entire product line of fine papers.
In 2001, Sun Capital Partners acquired the Hamilton facility and created SMART Papers as an independent manufacturer of fine printing and converting papers. Five years later, the Plainfield Special Situation Fund purchased SMART Papers.
In 2009, SMART Papers sold it's premium uncoated printing papers business and brands to Mohawk Fine Papers, Inc., Cohoes, NY. In addition, we named Mohawk the exclusive marketer to traditional papers distributers worlwide for our Kromekote, Knightkote Matte and SMART Digital premium coated papers.
SMART Papers will continue to sell its coated brands directly to strategic accounts worldwide, including specialty and technical converters, OEM's, label manufacturers, laminators, packaging printers, gift and box wrap printers, and greeting card companies.
And, because we believe the future is now, we’ve been hard at work creating products for the latest digital printing technologies, converter and packaging paper markets.
It’s all part of our history, which has been consistently punctuated by smart choices designed to serve customers well.