How much does it cost to ship one popsicle stick from China to Canada?
It probably doesn’t cost very much, but if you had to ship billions of sticks it could get expensive. This is what the good people at Global Sticks Inc. must have been thinking when they decided to produce their own sticks a little closer to their North American market.
They also decided to build the world’s newest and most sophisticated wood stick manufacturing facility in the municipality of Oliver-Paipoonge, on the outskirts of the city of Thunder Bay in Canada.
Global Sticks is one of the world’s largest manufacturers of popsicle sticks, paint paddles, pogo sticks and tongue depressors in the world. The local plant is prepared to whittle out over 8 billion ice cream sticks per year. It will require 130 full-time employees to accomplish this.
If you check the corporation’s international website you will see the new local facility enthusiastically announced to the world along with the address on Arthur Street. Thunder Bay goes global.
Also located on the same site is Stormax International, a company that makes stick handling and packaging equipment. How convenient. Stormax will be employing 10 people initially with future plans to hire 15 more.
Congratulations to all those involved in pulling this one off. The province is patting itself on the back for helping with the funding, and that is very important, but what impresses me the most is the way it all happened without major obstacles or controversy like, say, a wind farm or a waterfront project.
I don’t know much about the business details but it must have taken co-operation, skilled negotiators and visionary leadership to get this job done. Finally we have a practical example of what is meant by “value added forest products.”
This deal seems to be, as they say, a very good fit. This new state of the art plant is located in the middle of a forest full of the target species, white birch. It is one of our more under utilized hardwoods and highly prized in the stick world.
Are you kidding me? Those trees grow wild around here. We burn the stuff to heat our homes and roast our marshmallows. Who knew we were sitting on a gold mine, or more accurately, a wood mine.
But as the scientists at Global Sticks know, white birch makes excellent sticks. We’re talking high quality merchandise here whether it’s swizzle, ice cream, coffee or even yardsticks. Also included are pencils, craft supplies and customized specialty items.
A tree becomes much more valuable when it’s cut down into small sticks and each piece is sold separately. Birch firewood sells for about $100 a cord. I wonder what a cord of popsicle sticks would go for?
We have the location and we have the wood but we also have the skilled work force necessary to make it all happen. These new hires will be working for a company that believes in environmentally friendly manufacturing using renewable resources. Cut that birch. We can grow more.
Everybody has heard that old cliché “when you’re given lemons, you make lemonade.” Well, now we know what to do when we are given a good supply of white birch. Make sticks.
There’s a lesson to be learned here. Instead of looking elsewhere for solutions to our economic woes maybe it’s time to make the best of what’s around. I wonder what other unsqueezed lemons we can find.
Years ago any kid with a nickel could afford to buy a popsicle on a hot day. Each one came with two sticks and we never thought about where they came from. We just threw them away when the treat was gone.
And now those ubiquitous sticks are being made right here in our hometown from our very own white birch trees.
This is a positive local example of reverse globalization. In this case, rising fuel costs and huge distances made the Chinese sticks a little too costly. Thunder Bay is closer by an entire hemisphere. Let’s keep this trend going.
For those of you with a taste for irony, wouldn’t it be very interesting if Global Sticks decided to expand their specialty product line to include chopsticks.
Given the right circumstances this area could become the No. 1 supplier of quality white birch chopsticks for over a billion Chinese diners.
That would be taking pogos and popsicles to a whole new level.
It probably doesn’t cost very much, but if you had to ship billions of sticks it could get expensive. This is what the good people at Global Sticks Inc. must have been thinking when they decided to produce their own sticks a little closer to their North American market.
They also decided to build the world’s newest and most sophisticated wood stick manufacturing facility in the municipality of Oliver-Paipoonge, on the outskirts of the city of Thunder Bay in Canada.
Global Sticks is one of the world’s largest manufacturers of popsicle sticks, paint paddles, pogo sticks and tongue depressors in the world. The local plant is prepared to whittle out over 8 billion ice cream sticks per year. It will require 130 full-time employees to accomplish this.
If you check the corporation’s international website you will see the new local facility enthusiastically announced to the world along with the address on Arthur Street. Thunder Bay goes global.
Also located on the same site is Stormax International, a company that makes stick handling and packaging equipment. How convenient. Stormax will be employing 10 people initially with future plans to hire 15 more.
Congratulations to all those involved in pulling this one off. The province is patting itself on the back for helping with the funding, and that is very important, but what impresses me the most is the way it all happened without major obstacles or controversy like, say, a wind farm or a waterfront project.
I don’t know much about the business details but it must have taken co-operation, skilled negotiators and visionary leadership to get this job done. Finally we have a practical example of what is meant by “value added forest products.”
This deal seems to be, as they say, a very good fit. This new state of the art plant is located in the middle of a forest full of the target species, white birch. It is one of our more under utilized hardwoods and highly prized in the stick world.
Are you kidding me? Those trees grow wild around here. We burn the stuff to heat our homes and roast our marshmallows. Who knew we were sitting on a gold mine, or more accurately, a wood mine.
But as the scientists at Global Sticks know, white birch makes excellent sticks. We’re talking high quality merchandise here whether it’s swizzle, ice cream, coffee or even yardsticks. Also included are pencils, craft supplies and customized specialty items.
A tree becomes much more valuable when it’s cut down into small sticks and each piece is sold separately. Birch firewood sells for about $100 a cord. I wonder what a cord of popsicle sticks would go for?
We have the location and we have the wood but we also have the skilled work force necessary to make it all happen. These new hires will be working for a company that believes in environmentally friendly manufacturing using renewable resources. Cut that birch. We can grow more.
Everybody has heard that old cliché “when you’re given lemons, you make lemonade.” Well, now we know what to do when we are given a good supply of white birch. Make sticks.
There’s a lesson to be learned here. Instead of looking elsewhere for solutions to our economic woes maybe it’s time to make the best of what’s around. I wonder what other unsqueezed lemons we can find.
Years ago any kid with a nickel could afford to buy a popsicle on a hot day. Each one came with two sticks and we never thought about where they came from. We just threw them away when the treat was gone.
And now those ubiquitous sticks are being made right here in our hometown from our very own white birch trees.
This is a positive local example of reverse globalization. In this case, rising fuel costs and huge distances made the Chinese sticks a little too costly. Thunder Bay is closer by an entire hemisphere. Let’s keep this trend going.
For those of you with a taste for irony, wouldn’t it be very interesting if Global Sticks decided to expand their specialty product line to include chopsticks.
Given the right circumstances this area could become the No. 1 supplier of quality white birch chopsticks for over a billion Chinese diners.
That would be taking pogos and popsicles to a whole new level.
