Giant Group to Sell 2 Paper Companies

An Irish company that operates one of the world’s largest paper and packaging operations has announced a multimillion-dollar deal to purchase Beverly-Hills based Giant Group’s newsprint and recycling companies in Pomona.

Jefferson Smurfit Group, of Dublin, signed a letter of intent to buy all of the outstanding stock of Golden State Newsprint Co. and Pacific Recycling Co. for $95 million in cash. The purchase is scheduled to be completed during the next three months after regulatory approvals.

The Irish company will pay $25 million more if it decides to install a second recycled newsprint machine at the Pomona mill during the next two to three years, Burt Sugarman, Giant’s chairman and chief executive, said.

Sugarman called the facility, which belonged to Giant for 14 months, “a pivotal mill.”

“I am very ambivalent (about the sale), he said. ‘It’s a wonderful, wonderful newsprint mill.” He added that it is the only 100% recycled newsprint mill west of the Mississippi.

The purchase includes Golden State’s 135,000 ton-per-year recycled newsprint mill and 10 waste paper facilities operated by Pacific Recycling, which processes about 152,000 tons of waste paper annually. All of the 250 workers at both subsidiaries will be retained by the new owners, Sugarman said.

Last year, Golden State’s consolidated pretax income was between $8 million and $9 million, he said.