Ensocoat™ 60th anniversary – a piece of board-making history

Ensocoat™, Stora Enso’s flagship luxury packaging and graphical board, is celebrating its 60th anniversary. Since its inception in 1964, Ensocoat has evolved to become the go-to choice for brand owners seeking premium packaging material, and its journey is a testament to Stora Enso’s commitment to quality consistency and improvement. Throughout its long history, Ensocoat has continuously adapted to meet growing market demand for performance. In this article, we explore Ensocoat’s journey and the quality standards that have made it the most luxurious paperboard to date.

Ensocoat is produced at Stora Enso’s Imatra site in Finland on Board Machine (BM) 2. Brown kraftliner production on this line began in 1956, but BM 2 was designed from the outset to produce white packaging board to meet growing market demand. In 1963, a new mineral coating machine was introduced at the mill to produce board with a better printing surface. Around the same time, the mill’s birch pulp production capacity was increased, thus creating new opportunities for product development. The first production run of a mineral-coated speciality board was in 1964, signifying the initial steps in the development of Ensocoat.

In the mid‐1970s, BM 2 went through several renovations including a new inline section — improvements that elevated quality and efficiency. The line was designated to produce only fully white board for demanding packaging end uses and high‐quality print works, and at the same time, laboratory capabilities were strongly developed. Products intended for graphical end uses were tested for visual appearance and printing properties, such as cleanliness, shade, formation, ink density, and ink drying.
more at: https://www.storaenso.com/en/newsroom/news/2024/5/ensocoat-60