Inteplast Group has increased its business in Canada with the acquisition of a specialty polyethylene blown film coextruder.
Inteplast bought Haremar Plastic Manufacturing Ltd. on March 2 for undisclosed terms. Haremar, based in the Toronto suburb of Vaughan, Ontario, produces film for specialty food packaging, shrink wrap, mail and security applications, industrial packaging and liquid packaging. Its products include compostable films.
Inteplast at the same time acquired El-En Packaging Co., a Vaughan-based sister company to Haremar that produces garbage bags.
Inteplast of Livingston, N.J., already had eight film, sheet and bag plants in Canada. Spokeswoman Brenda Wilson noted in an email that Haremar and El-En will fit Inteplast's production of institutional and retail garbage bags in Canada. Haremar and El-En are located near several of Canada's prominent film extrusion machinery companies in the Toronto area.
Mark Lichtbau, former corporate vice president of Haremar, will continue to lead the Haremar business. His father and mother, Saul and Fela Lichtbau, founded the company in 1965 as a plastic film importer. Mark Lichtbau won the Plastics Innovator Award in 2014 given by the Canadian Plastics Industry Association.
“The sale to Inteplast will enable El-En and Haremar's legacy to continue and grow,” Mark Lichtbau stated in a news release. He referred questions to Inteplast.
The acquired companies are now operating as the Haremar Plastic Manufacturing Division of Inteplast Bags and Films Corp., and are being headed by Joe Chen, president of Inteplast's Integrated Bagging Systems.
“I was impressed with Haremar Plastics the moment I met Mrs. Lichtbau and her son Mark,” recalled Inteplast Group President John Young in a news release. “Their dedication and personal care for employees bring back wistful memories of our own humble roots started in Lolita, Texas, over two decades ago.”
Inteplast's Lolita site has since expanded to 525 acres and contains 12 plastics plants, some of which the company claims are the largest of their kind in the world. The firm says the Lolita operations alone have combined capacity exceeding 1 billion pounds of finished goods annually.
Inteplast, founded in 1991, is the third largest film and sheet manufacturer in North America with 2013 estimated sales of $2.22 billion, according to Plastics News' recent survey of the sector. It runs 50 plants, seven offices and 14 warehouses in North America and employs more than 6,500.