✨ The entire team at La Rochette Cartonboard SAS wishes you a very happy festive season!
We would like to thank our employees, customers, suppliers and partners for a year rich in projects, collaborations and successes.
🎉 See you in 2025 for another year at your side as we continue to write a new page in the history of cartonboard.
Throughout the year, we’ve taken you step by step through the various departments and phases of our manufacturing process.
Now it’s time for the final stage, where we meet the specific needs of our customers: the Transformation & Expedition service.
Our customers can order our cartonboard:
– In reels: in the form of large ‘mother reels’ or smaller ‘daughter reels’.
– In format: sheets piled on pallets.
The process in detail:
– For daughter reels:
The mother reels are unwound, their edges removed, then cut to the width requested by the customer before being rewound on a mandrel.
– For format pallets:
A mother reel is unwound, its edges removed, then cut to width and length using a slitter to obtain sheets. These sheets are then piled onto pallets.
Once ready, the daughter reels and pallets are shrink-wrapped, labelled and stored before shipment.
📊 Some key figures:
– Around 1/3 of production is delivered as daughter reels, while the rest is shipped on pallets.
– We manufacture an average of 800 pallets a day, depending on our customers’ orders.
On Thursday 5 December, alongside our counterparts, we represented the paper and cardboard industry at the Mondial des Métiers exhibition at Eurexpo Lyon, on the Paper and Cardboard Industry stand.
On the programme:
👉 Sharing our expertise and promoting our products.
👉 Inspiring the younger generation to explore the many opportunities offered by our industry.
👉 Exchange ideas with other players committed to the future of our businesses.
The event was also an opportunity to present our industry’s environmental commitments: using renewable energy, reducing our carbon footprint, promoting the circular economy and innovation. 🌱
Thank you to our visitors and partners!
👉 In contrast to popular belief, the paper and cartonboard industry is one of the lowest industrial emitters of greenhouse gases, accounting for 0.9% of European emissions in 2021. Most of the energy used to produce paper and cartonboard comes from renewable sources, with a low carbon footprint.
📊 A few figures:
– Between 1990 and 2022, carbon emissions per tonne produced fell by 50% ;
– The European paper industry is the largest producer and user of renewable energy: 61% of its thermal energy comes from renewable sources, mainly biomass (60.5%) ;
– 54.6% of the electricity used by the industry is self-generated, with over 95% coming from cogeneration plants (combined heat and power);
– In France, the proportion of heat produced from decarbonised energy rose from 49% to 59% between 2005 and 2022.
🔎 Focus on La Rochette Cartonboard SAS:
✅ We produce the steam needed for our process using a biomass boiler, which in turn feeds a counter-pressure turbine to generate green electricity.
✅ In 2022, we carried out a carbon report with the support of the BPI (ADEME’s Bilan Carbone® methodology) to target a 30% reduction in our GHG emissions (scopes 1 & 2) by 2030.
✅ A photovoltaic farm project is underway to boost our share of green energy production and reduce our dependence on the grid.
👉 Sustainably managed forests play a key role in combating climate change, preserving biodiversity and providing a responsible supply of natural resources.
The FSC and PEFC labels guarantee the conservation of natural habitats, respect for workers’ rights and a traceable supply chain from the forest to the end user.
🌱 Why plant forests?
– Reduce pressure on natural forests;
– To guarantee a sustainable supply for the cartonboard and paper industries ;
– Maintain an environmental balance by promoting local biodiversity.
🔎 Focus on La Rochette Cartonboard SAS:
To make the pulp needed to create our cartonboard, wood fibre is sourced from sustainable forest management and integrated throughout the manufacturing process. The mechanical pulp manufactured directly at our plant is made from 100% softwood (fir, spruce, Douglas fir) from the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region and from local partner sawmills located within an average radius of 100 km from the plant. 100% of the pulp used by our factory is PEFC (PEFC/10-31-1001) and/or FSC® FSC – C120067 and/or Controlled Wood certified.
On Wednesday 27 November, we were honoured to welcome Maître Roger Rebut, the Judicial Administrator designated by the Chambéry Commercial Court in 1985, on a tour of our factory with old colleagues and friends in his company.
💬 Maître Rebut has played a key role in the history of our company:
‘I was lucky enough to work on the Cartonneries de La Rochette case in 1984-1985. The company had 450 employees when it went into receivership. […] As luck would have it, he [Jean-Marie Babyloyne] quickly put me in touch with the Quebec company Cascades and the Lemaire brothers.’ Extract from his testimony in our anniversary book
Thank you to Maître Rebut and his entourage for this visit, which highlights the importance of the decisions, meetings and perseverance that have played a part in shaping the history of our plant.
👉 200 sheets of Rochcoat 300g, made in France, locally in Savoie, have been supplied to make 300 money boxes designed by the students of the BUT Packaging Emballage et Conditionnement course at the IUT in Chambéry.
The money boxes will be displayed in Savoie shops on 28 and 29 November to raise funds for the AFM-Téléthon Savoie.
The Téléthon, an association created in 1987, helps people suffering from genetic diseases or rare illnesses:
✅ 3 research centres in France;
✅ Development of treatments with positive results;
✅ Support for the 3 million people affected and assistance for their families.
In 2023, in Savoie, 134 events raised €245,062, contributing to a national total of €92,905,533!
📊 Do you know the statistics for the Paper and Cardboard Industry (PCI) in France? The PCI is:
– 1,500 companies,
– 63,500 employees,
– 30% women.
(source: Industrie Papier Carton)
💼 What makes the paper and cardboard industry unique?
✔️ An industry with a sustainable future: With several centuries of history, we innovate to meet the environmental challenges of tomorrow.
✔️ Living professions: Working with living materials such as wood and water, our industry makes the most of renewable resources.
✔️ Everyday jobs: As part of the circular economy, we offer practical alternatives to plastic.
✔️ Innovative businesses: Always looking for new solutions, we imagine the packaging of tomorrow.
🔎 Focus on La Rochette Cartonboard SAS:
At La Rochette Cartonboard SAS, to manufacture our pulp, we use forestry chips harvested from local sawyers in the Auvergne Rhône-Alpes region within an average 100km radius of the factory.
Water, which is also essential to our process, is collected from the river near the plant: the Joudron.
👀 Next: Do you think the paper industry is bad for the forest? See you next week to deconstruct this myth!
On Wednesday 20 November, as part of Industry Week, we welcomed 13 teachers from lower and upper secondary schools in Savoie and Isère.
This plant visit was organised in partnership with the CGénial Rhône-Alpes Foundation, which connects schools with the business world. 🎓 💼
Aims of the event :
✔️ Discover our company and its history, which dates back to 1873;
✔️ Present the jobs in the paper and cardboard industry;
✔️ Explain our industrial process, which combines tradition, innovation and respect for the environment;
✔️ Promote our Made in France expertise, which is anchored in the local economy.
Thank you to these teachers, true ambassadors, for inspiring and guiding future generations towards careers in the paper and board industry.
💬 ‘Since 1873, La Rochette Cartonboard SAS […] has been promoting its Made in France expertise and making a lasting contribution to the local economy. Respecting its origins while adopting a sustainable and eco-responsible model, it perpetuates the history of the traditional paper-making basin of the Alps.’
As part of Savoie’s industrial heritage, we are featured in issue 53 of La Rubrique des Patrimoines de Savoie (Autumn 2024).
You can read about our history on page 29 👉 https://lnkd.in/dRqBFr_z
Many thanks to the Savoie department and the Conservation du Patrimoine for this highlight!
