Over 100 years of envelope manufacturing comes unstuck
Nick Mones, CEO and major shareholder of iconic envelope producer, Australian Envelopes, was overseas on holidays when the company went into shock administration with all employees stood down.
Staff across Australia were told to go home at midday Thursday as administrators, PPB Advisory, moved in. The shutdown of all sales and manufacturing plants happened suddenly and with no warning.
Operations have been scaled back to ‘care and maintenance’ levels while PPB undertakes an assessment of the business.
The century old manufacturer, printer and marketer of standard and special make envelopes went into insolvency as it could not be sold or pay its debts. PPB is now trying to gauge the level of interest in the Group’s business and assets.
The shock closure came as a complete surprise to staff. At the NSW office in Granville only a shell-shocked receptionist was handling phone calls, while another lonely staffer manned the phones at the Wangara manufacturing plant in WA. It is understood all staff were paid up to the time they were stood down without notice.
In addition to production facilities in Notting Hill in Victoria and Wangara in WA, every state branch offered printing and warehousing facilities. Throughout the group equipment dedicated to making key product lines 24 hours per day include:
- 43 overprinting machines with 1 to 4 colour process
- 23 high-speed web making machines all with in-line flexographic print capability – two with 4 colour process print capability
- 7 blank making machines capable of making the widest range of products manufactured in Australia from pre-printed sheets or specialty paper
Troy Cameron, general manager of Camerons Group says it feels for the employees as “it is early days in the administration, and there would be a great deal of uncertainty for them all.
“I feel its unlikely that the hole left by them can be filled by any one company, Camerons will be working with other companies to develop sustainable relationships.”