Paper Price Inflation 2010

We've had quite a few years of relative stability in the price of copier paper...... but sadly that seems to be coming to an end!

On of our policies at harrisongreen is to try and keep a stability of brand of paper, and to try and avoid the very cheapest 'white box' products which can be very inconsistent as we can't always be sure of exactly what is inside the box!

Over recent months this has been difficult to do as paper has been increasingly difficult to source consistently. We are now experiencing the industry wide supply issues that are affecting the whole paper market here in the UK.

Its worth just explaining a number of factors that are coming together now to cause these difficulties;



UK Paper Market Update

To understand the reasons why this is happening we have to look at the UK paper market as a whole and identify the key reasons for this:-

1. Sell price in the UK by paper mills to merchants is the lowest throughout Europe

2. Scottish paper mill closed down last year and all production moved to Brazil

3. Brazil production now sold into North and south American markets as opposed to UK

4. New Portuguese paper mill opened last year, but only running at around 75% capacity

5. Finnish dockers on stike blocking ports in finland

6. Swedish dockers about to go on strike (not confirmed but highly likely) – both affecting supply

7. Euro against the pound

8. Price of pulp up 27% in the last 3 months


In short the paper mills would rather sell to Europe and other markets before the UK, therefore restricting supply in order to force prices up. Which is happening now!!!


So whilst we work as hard as we can to keep paper prices steady, inevitably we will need to increase over the coming weeks and months....... but rest assured that we will only apply increases which are absolutely necessary.