Category Archives: Business

Madison Paper buckled under big spike in Canadian imports

In announcing the closure of Madison Paper Industries, observers pointed to a one-two punch of declining domestic demand and rising imports, alongside high winter energy costs. Federal import figures give a picture of just what the mill was up against in recent years. From July-December, imports of supercalendered paper from Canada were up 90 percent by volume and […]

In casino revenues, a battle over Maine slot dominance

The latest revenue figures from Maine’s two casinos show the gaming pie keeps getting bigger, up another 2 percent after growing at less than 1 percent in 2014. Hollywood Casino’s net revenue was down slightly in 2015 as Oxford Casino’s rose again, up to $76.6 million. As other casinos try to enter the market in Maine, the current operators have raised concern […]

If you’re not reading this, you may be out buying gift cards

The Portland-based digital gift card processor CashStar said its annual survey of online shoppers revealed most gift cards are likely to fly out the door as close to the Christmas holiday as humanly possible. That appears to be true for at least one of the Portland company’s corporate clients: Starbucks. On Tuesday, Starbucks said it’s expecting to […]

Maine-based companies got dinged, too, in Monday’s market correction

Maine has few publicly traded companies, but the stock prices of those headquartered here and those with major ties to the state did get dinged in the market-wide correction Monday. By the market’s close, the S&P 500 index was down 3.94 percent and the Dow Jones industrial average was down 3.57 percent, after early-morning panic that saw some […]

Verso’s Jay shutdown adds to massive drop in U.S. paper capacity

LEWISTON SUN-JOURAL PHOTO BY AMBER WATERMAN

For perhaps the second year in a row, hundreds of Verso paper mill employees in Maine may face losing their jobs around the holidays (late 2015 or early 2016, the company says). It absolutely sucks, whatever the reason. And the almost unrelenting bad news for paper mill workers in the state hurts more against the memory of what was, for sure. After […]

Cold winter didn’t sap Maine maple syrup production

Maine produced more maple syrup in 2015 than the previous year, despite a bitterly cold winter that shortened the average number of harvesting days for Maine taps. Maine was again behind Vermont and New York for syrup production, holding fast to third place in the country for maple syrup output, producing about 553,000 gallons last year. That’s a little more than […]

Where the most Maine businesses are going it alone

Per capita, Knox County is Maine’s capital for solo business owners. Census figures released Thursday show businesses that have no employees, by county. For every 100 people, Knox County has 12.7 businesses with no employees, most of which are sole proprietorships. Hancock and Lincoln counties are close behind. The census bureau excludes these businesses from its data for their relatively small economic impact […]