Beaver Paper Forges Partnership to Employ People with Disabilities

(PRESS RELEASE) WILLSTÄTT, GERMANY – Beaver Paper Group – a print provider with operations in Atlanta, Georgia and Willstätt near parent company Koehler – has entered into a partnership with Hanauerland Werkstätten, part of the civic and social organization Diakonie Kork.

The Diakonie Kork workshops employ people with disabilities and have several sheet-cutting machines with enough staff to pack the sheets. Both parties benefited from the collaboration and managed to significantly increase the cutting volume in a short space of time.

“It quickly became clear that the existing capacity at Diakonie Kork would not be sufficient,” says Tobias Sternbeck, CEO of Beaver Paper, who added the cooperation should continue.

Deciding that a fast and straightforward solution was required, Beaver Paper and Hanauerland Werkstätten invested in a new cutting machine. Baumann Maschinenbau Solms GmbH & Co. KG was chosen to supply the machine, and the company was also prepared to make a contribution to the project by adjusting the price accordingly.

The new machine was put into operation within five months of the decision being made. “We are amazed at how well a cooperation like this can run; this is the first such project that we have been involved in,” says Uwe Streit, sales further processing, Baumann.

Beaver Paper sees this as an investment in both a trustworthy partner and in social responsibility: “With this in mind, we also wanted to give these processing steps to the workshops for people with disabilities, since we are very much committed to helping them participate in the job market,” says Sternbeck.

Hajo Maelger, operations manager in Kork, adds, “We now employ a team of eight people with disabilities to work on the new machine. Everything runs smoothly as we have divided the work into small steps. The excitement about the new machine and the feeling of playing an important part in a task makes a huge contribution to the satisfaction of all those involved in the process.”

His colleague Markus Deger from production management is also delighted with the cooperation. “We have been active in paper processing for many years. The collaboration with Koehler represents a new dimension for use and one which will make us stronger for the future,” he says. “We are working with a machine that meets the requirements of the employer’s liability insurance association from the start and protects our employees.”