The laminate rolls had just been moved into the new premises over the course of the day, with workers finishing the job around 5pm on Saturday.
Less than 90 minutes later the building was on fire, causing local residents to be evacuated, and totally destroying the stock and the building. No-one was inside the building at the time of the fire.
The PKCCO laminate films are manufactured in Korea and supplied in this country by Graph-Pak Packaging Supplies, which is a joint venture between Graph-Pak and Dimension 1. PKCCO is one of the top three selling laminate films in Australia. Customers are split between printers and trade shops.
Tom Ralph, managing director of Graph-Pak says, “The fire is a complete mystery, however what is important now is to ensure supply is maintained to our customers. Fortunately, in fact almost miraculously, we had a 40’
container arrive from Korea the day after the fire, and another is due in two weeks, and our Korean partner has told us it will pull out all the manufacturing stops and should have new laminate here in less than a month, with three 40’ containers now scheduled to be flown in. After that we will be back to normal with containers coming in by boat.
“In addition have some stock in Brisbane and Melbourne earmarked for customers there, many of whom have said we can draw down that stock until we get new supply. Many of our major customers have already phoned me to offer their support, which has been fantastic.
“So for the majority of customers there will be no disruption to supply, although for some of those that require some specialty stock we have had to advise them that we will be unlikely to meet their needs in the short term.”
In addition to being a JV partner with Graph-Pak for the lamination business Dimension 1 is a leading paper converter, but it’s main business is located in a separate building further down the same street, and was unaffected by the fire. Its general manager Ashley Goldsbrough says, “Thankfully we are safe, none of our paper stock, nor our customers’ stock, nor our machinery is in the building that was on fire, so in that regard it is business as usual.”
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