Stansberry brothers predict continued growth at new Columbia paper plant

by Bondi Wood

October 3,2008

Doug Stansberry (left) and Ed Stansberry.

For more than 30 years, business experts have been predicting that the office of the future would be paperless. With a PC on every desk, sophisticated software programs and enormous data storage systems, digital documentation was supposed to make paper obsolete for record-keeping, bookkeeping and other tasks.

But the success of Doug and Ed Stansberry, co-owners of Premier Paper and Packaging, illustrates the continued popularity of printed publications as the major medium of exchanging information.

Carbonless paper, like those used in most multi-page business forms, is an $8 billion a year industry in the United States.

Doug Stansberry acknowledges that some types of paper consumption have diminished, but it is still a growing industry. “Copy paper continues to grow at a rate of 2 to 3 percent a year,” he said.

Premier Paper and Packaging outgrew its facility in Moberly and the Stansberrys moved their operation to Columbia at the end of last year.

Premier Paper and Packaging sells three distinct types of products in 25 states and maintains an inventory of $1.8 million in paper products in the warehouse on Boone Industrial Drive.

“We sell fine paper, packaging materials and industrial paper products,” Ed Stansberry said. Fine paper includes copy paper, printing paper and other office products. Packaging products include corrugated boxes, custom made cushioned packaging, shrink wrap and packaging machines. Premier Paper and Packaging’s industrial line includes chemicals, hand sanitizers, cleaning machines and paper towels.

Typical customers are manufacturers, printing centers, publishers, government agencies and educational institutions.

The Stansberry brothers first opened Premier Paper and Packaging in Moberly in 1994. After years of selling paper for other companies, the pair decided to launch their own business.

Doug Stansberry looks over products in the Premier Paper warehouse.

“For Ed and I, we come from a business background, but there’s a difference between being a business person and an entrepreneur,” Doug said. “We opened our business in 1994 during the middle of a very tight paper market.”

“We started from scratch. We were born and raised in Moberly and had good connections with the banks there,” Ed said.

Premier Paper produces a variety of products.

Originally, Premier Paper and Packaging opened in a 13,000-square foot facility, eventually expanding to 40,000 square feet

“We came to the realization that we couldn’t expand any more in Moberly and we began looking,” Doug said. They chose to move to an 88,000 square-foot warehouse and office facility in Columbia, which had once housed Summit Polymers, an automotive parts maker.

“We didn’t have to do much reconfiguring. It offered us what we needed,” Ed said. What they needed was a facility that could accommodate their own trucks and the daily deliveries of paper and paper products by outside carriers. With eight loading docks and nearly seven acres of land, the location was a good fit for the growing business, which opened its doors in Columbia in December 2007.

The brothers own the business equally and split duties based on their expertise. “I’m the money man, and Doug’s the sales guy,” Ed said.

Premier Paper and Packaging employs 15 people, but Ed said they anticipate hiring more warehouse help. The brothers are somewhat unconventional in their hiring practices. “We may not always have an employment opportunity in front of us, but when we find good people we try to hire them,” Doug said.

Their system has worked. With increased sales, sales territory and very little employee turnover, the Stansberrys are expanding their sales market in the Dallas area.

“We’re thinking Texas will double our business and drive the need for some support jobs here,” Doug said.

Although Ed describes the company’s service area as “primarily in our own backyard,” they have protected territory rights in 25 states for their “giroform” carbonless paper products.

The giroform line of paper products is milled in Bielefeld, Germany and owned by automaker Mitsubishi. Doug said he and his brother get some criticism for buying paper outside U.S. borders, but added the German plant offers a more economical product at a consistently higher level of quality than what they can purchase stateside.

“We can order from Germany, have it shipped out of Hamburg into New York City, travel by rail to St. Louis and trucked to mid-Missouri cheaper than we can buy it here in the US. It’s a real shame,” Doug said.

If there are no problems with customs, the process takes 12 weeks; however, there have been shipments held up for as long as four weeks at customs, according to Ed.

Despite the 12-week delivery schedule, Doug and Ed cite their concern for the environment as another reason for their partnership with Mitsubishi HiTec Paper. The German facility is state-of-the-art and environmentally responsible and has been awarded the Swan certification for environmentally friendly production practices, a Nordic award based on “environmental activities considered exemplary on a world-wide basis.”

Ed estimates that there are only two other major suppliers of the giroform products in the United States, one in Pennsylvania and one on the West Coast. To accommodate the 25-state service area of giroform customers, Premier Paper and Packaging has a sales representative in Chicago, in addition to the two recently added in the Dallas area.

Always looking for new products or services to offer, Doug and Ed are currently retrofitting a paper splitter which will allow them to order more bulk roll paper and cut it to customer specifications. The pair is also launching a new sanitizing machine that doesn’t require chemicals, but uses vapor to sanitize surfaces. “It’s perfect for schools, hospitals or restaurants, where they need to clean but don’t want to use harsh chemicals,” Doug said.

The brothers are skeptical of Internet and credit card orders and prefer to conduct business face to face. “We’ve been burned a couple of times on Internet orders,” Doug said. “We value the relationships we build with our customers,” Ed said, adding, “We accommodate them any way we can.”

While Premier Paper and Packaging sells primarily in large quantities, they do not require a minimum order and sell to small businesses, as well as their larger accounts.

“We are customer driven,” Doug said. “If we could get a good ice cream sandwich account today, we’d be putting in refrigeration units tomorrow.”

Warehouse Manager Stacey Smith organizes a new shipment of Giroform carbonless paper by Mitsubishi. The paper is one of Premier Paper's top selling items.

Ed Stansberry.

Premier Paper
1550 Boone Industrial Drive
Columbia, Mo. 65202
Phone: 800-320-8970
Web site: www.premierpaper.com