Champion International Paper

Champion International Paper was a large paper and wood products producer based in Stamford, Connecticut.

The company was founded by Peter G. Thomson, who had purchased patents to a card coating machine from Charles H. Gage, president of the Champion Card and Paper Co. of Pepperell, Massachusetts, who in exchange received a half-interest in Thomson's venture. Thomson established the Champion Coated Paper Co. in 1893, building a plant in Hamilton, Ohio, 20 miles (32 km) north of Cincinnati on the Great Miami River. Thomson at first advertised his company as the "western branch" of the better-known Massachusetts concern. However, Thomson soon bought out Gage, and the entire Champion operation was moved to Ohio.

The Champion factory was completely destroyed in a December 1901 fire. It was rebuilt and back in operation by June 1902. The factory was again destroyed in the Great Flood of 1913, when fire broke out; the factory was again rebuilt, this time in three months.

In the late 1930s, it opened a plant in Pasadena, Texas.

Peter Thomson died in 1931, and the company was taken over by his eldest son, Alexander. Another son, Logan, took over Champion in 1935, and remained in charge until his death in 1946.

Champion was the largest coated paper mill in the country through World War II, but struggled after the war. The company laid off a third of its workforce in 1961, and merged with U. S. Plywood Corp. in 1967, forming U. S. Plywood-Champion Papers Inc. The name was changed to Champion International Paper in 1972.

In the 1980s, Champion's Chief Executive Officer, Andrew C. Sigler, pushed the company to find new ways to redesign work and improve the operations and quality of products. This led to a more than decade long change effort strongly guided by principles of sociotechnical design. Eventually, the success of initial projects led the whole company to adopt the same process. By various measures of revenue, output, and quality, the changes were successful.

In the 1990s, projected environmental concerns were expected to affect the company's prospects for future growth. For example, in the US, the growing awareness that the country was running out of space in its garbage dumps; and this signaled unanticipated changes in the markets served by the paper industry. Also, minimum standards for the use of recycled paper were adopted in the US and elsewhere. Concerns about water pollution and toxic waste as a byproduct of the milling process were increasing as well. In particular, Champion settled on several lawsuits brought by North Carolina and Tennessee over their Canton, North Carolina site; and by 1997 had sold the paper mill there.

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