Who is Mint Valley Paper? Are you affiliated with a bigger organization?
Mint Valley Paper is a small company focused on the production of tissue and towel parent rolls. Our customers will be primarily independent converters who operate in North America.
Mint Valley has five primary investors, all of whom have worked in and around the paper industry for years. Between us, we have a combined technical and operating experience of over 75 years in the tissue and towel business. (Read more about the Mint Valley team members.) One of our key strengths is our people; we believe our extensive, diverse experience in operations, maintenance, environmental compliance, community stewardship, and organizational development results in an innovative approach.
Mint Valley is a new, independent paper company focused on implementing best industry practices. We also have some new, modern ideas regarding the importance and necessity of meeting environmental, business, and community responsibilities.
Describe your organization’s approach to sustainable business practices.
One of our core beliefs is that, to achieve success, businesses need to move beyond a focus on short-term profits and instead focus on long-term sustainability. This means a lot more than simply being “green.” We place a high priority on environmental protection, employee well-being, community relationships, and customer partnerships. It is easy to state these ideas as goals, but at Mint Valley these ideas are the focus of our business strategy.
Corporate social responsibility is a core value of our team. We’ve developed a business model that incorporates what is called triple bottom line accounting. This is a way of measuring success that factors in social, environmental, and economic progress. Read more about Mint Valley’s approach to responsibility and sustainability.
What key elements determine Mint Valley’s pursuit of one project over another?
All key initiatives for Mint Valley need to be consistent with our core principles and business approach. We are focused on relatively small operating facilities that are geographically centric to our customer’s locations. Local production of products that are consumed locally reduces our operation’s carbon footprint.
We believe in utilizing the best technology and information systems. We are an innovative company, and employing technology that optimizes our product quality and cost structure is critical to our success.
We are NOT focused on reducing headcount like a lot of other corporations. We believe in family-wage positions filled by individual people who are fully engaged in making our business successful are the key to our success.
How does Mint Valley complete employee selection?
We will follow an employee selection process that will be administered by local resources, where available. We are committed to providing equal opportunities for members of our communities.
Our processes demand a high degree of mechanical ability, troubleshooting skills, leadership and technical ability. Because of this, we are very careful to select the right people for our operations. We are interested in selecting people with good interpersonal skills. We believe in engaging our people to their fullest capability, and we require a free and open discussion of our business practices among our employees.
Consistency in our selection process ensures fairness to everyone who applies to positions in our company. All prospective employees go through the same process, which exemplifies our core belief in having respect for everyone we interface with. We value past experience, and appreciate people who have experience in our industry.
How is the Mint Valley business model and approach different?
Mint Valley’s strategic approach to business is to satisfy the needs of local consumers. This requires us to keep our operations relatively small, with low cost structures that enable our customers to be successful in their business.
We subscribe to an operating structure that allows all of our people to safely operate and maintain the equipment. Our commitment to ongoing training processes is vital to help our employees be successful in our organization.
We have a vision for our facilities that’s targeted at being effective on all aspects of our business. Cross training of our employees means that our approach to maintenance is a bit different from a traditional way in pulp and paper mills. Our technicians need to work together to keep our operations running smoothly. Strategic implementation of resources allows our company to provide jobs, meet environmental goals, and grow our business opportunities.
What is your approach to labor?
Mint Valley Paper believes in paying prevailing-wage rates for everyone affiliated with our organization, including contractors and other companies supplying our company. Our employees will also have full medical, dental, vision coverage as well as a 401k plan and educational benefits.
What type of Eco-Labeling will your products have?
There are many types of Eco labels right now. Our research into the organizations that provide the Eco labels has shown that there are a wide variety of requirements and reporting standards. Some Eco labels are provided by responsible, stringent, independent companies who are focused on helping companies become good corporate citizens and rewarding those companies with their Eco label. Some Eco label providers are strategically aligned with the organizations they are supposed to be auditing, compromising the label. Other Eco labels rely on self-reporting, to keep the cost of getting the Eco label affordable, but at a loss of eco-authenticity.
Mint Valley Paper is committed to following best practices to the best of our ability, always. We believe that following our vision with our actions is the most important part of our product, not finding a label that we can put on it. We are not actively pursuing an Eco label at this time. Instead, we are hoping that by doing what is right for the environment and the community will make the name Mint Valley Paper the only label we will need to have.