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When you think of international trade, you may look at the label in your shirt or tag in your shoes to find out what country they are manufactured in, but what about something as simple as the paper for bags used to package your to-go lunch? With fast food stores now located worldwide, how do the fast food chains supply all of their stores with all the bags they need? One of the places paper is made for fast food carry out bags is Port Townsend, Washington at the Port Townsend Paper Corporation (PTPC). The Boomerang Box is currently carrying a shipment of PTPC paper to Singapore which will be made into carry out bags for fast food chains. Port Townsend Paper Corporation produces many kinds of pulp and paper products for sale in markets around the world. Their extensive worldwide export market is serviced by container vessels operated by companies like APL, Limited out of the Ports of Seattle and Tacoma. Breakbulk shipments leave directly from the Port Townsend mill dock or from the Ports of Vancouver and Victoria in British Columbia as well as Bellingham, Seattle and Tacoma in the United States (can you find these ports in an atlas or on a globe?). To produce these pulp and paper products, Port Townsend Paper Corporation uses wood chips which are leftover uniform pieces of wood purchased from sawmills and whole log chipping operations located throughout Puget Sound and British Columbia. The process goes like this...
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Port Townsend Paper has two plants in which paper is converted into bags. At the Port Townsend Bag Plant, the 21 bag machines, operated by skilled employees, can convert over 1,000,000,000 bags and sacks a year. The bags are designed to serve the grocery, fast food, and retail packaging markets in 13 western continental states, Alaska and Hawaii. The bags are warehoused in 3 separate locations to provide fast, efficient service to these markets. The other bag plant located in Portland, Oregon converts bags that serve the retail packaging market throughout the west, Alaska and Hawaii through over 35 different distributors. The product is warehoused in 3 separate facilities in the Northwest and South California. During an average shift, each operator will manufacture and bale approximately 160,000 bags. They check the imprint and the bottom seal. They check for tears and for holes. When any of the flaws are found, the bag is recycled to eliminate waste as well as any mistakes. The 425 people at these two plants work together to keep Port Townsend Paper running around the clock, seven days a week, meeting the needs of customers worldwide. Although the basics of bag making hasn’t changed much over the last 60 years, what has changed is the ability to deliver bags paper on time in our international market. |
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