Moving Every Stone: How Lessebo Paper Aligns Craft, Chemistry and Continuous Improvement

For more than 300 years, Lessebo Paper has been producing paper in the forests of southern Sweden, surrounded by lakes that reflect not only the landscape, but the consequences of industrial activity.

“If something enters the water, you see it immediately,” says Ebba Ingvarsson, Key Account Manager & Communications Manager. “You cannot separate what you do from the environment around you.”

That proximity has shaped more than operations. It has shaped a mindset — one where sustainability is not introduced as a strategy, but embedded as a condition of doing business.

Today, that mindset is being tested and structured in new ways. With the recertification of its uncoated papers and boards under the most demanding version of the Cradle to Cradle Certified® Product Standard to date — Version 4.1 — Lessebo Paper is not simply maintaining performance, but re-examining how its organisation operates, documents, and evolves.

Looking Closer: When Improvement Becomes Systematic

What emerges from Lessebo’s journey is not a story of a single breakthrough, but of depth.

“The process has been long and very detailed,” Ingvarsson reflects. “We have moved every stone — to really look at everything we do and ask where we can do better,” she adds, referencing a Swedish expression about leaving nothing unexamined in the search for improvement.

That effort was not limited to materials or product composition. Instead, much of the work unfolded within the organisation itself.

Practices that had been part of daily operations for years — how materials are handled, how safety is managed, how decisions are made — were revisited, formalised, and aligned. Systems that existed in practice were translated into systems that could be consistently followed, reviewed, and improved.

This included strengthening environmental and organisational management systems, aligning policies and procedures with evolving requirements, and documenting routines that had previously existed without being formally captured.

In this sense, the transition to Version 4.1 marks a shift from intention to accountability. It is no longer enough to do the right things; organisations are increasingly expected to demonstrate how those actions are structured, embedded, and continuously evaluated.

At Lessebo Paper, this has led to a more deliberate integration of sustainability into everyday work — not as an add-on, but as part of how the business functions.

When Material Choices Travel Upstream

Some changes, however, extend beyond internal systems.

During its certification journey, Lessebo Paper made a deliberate decision to move from elemental chlorine-free pulp to totally chlorine-free pulp — a shift with direct implications for both chemical safety and water quality.

Rather than treating this as a constraint, the company used it as a point of alignment with its suppliers.

“We made it clear that we would only use totally chlorine-free pulp going forward,” says Ingvarsson. “That also meant our supplier had to adjust.”

What begins as a material choice at product level can, in practice, reshape upstream production. In this case, a shift in demand required the supplier to adapt its processes — illustrating how decisions taken within one company can influence how materials are produced further along the value chain.

The result is reflected in Lessebo Paper’s performance, including Gold-level achievement in both Material Health and Water Stewardship — a combination that remains challenging to reach in industrial production contexts. 

At the same time, water cannot be considered in isolation from the chemistry that interacts with it. Understanding which substances are used, how they behave, and how they are managed throughout the process is critical — not only for environmental performance, but also for product safety.

Paper may be used in a wide range of applications, from printed materials to packaging, including uses that come into close contact with people. In some cases, it is used for packaging such as premium food boxes, where expectations around safety and material integrity are particularly high.

In this context, chemical transparency becomes a foundation for both compliance and trust — supporting not only recyclability, but confidence in how materials perform across their lifecycle. 

Cradle to Cradle Certified® materials can support manufacturers by providing verified chemical transparency, reducing complexity in material selection, and enabling safer and more circular product design.

As Ingvarsson notes, sustainability in this context is both a “push and pull” dynamic — driven by increasing customer demand, but also shaped by the company’s own efforts to educate and engage the market. 

Staying in Motion

For Lessebo Paper, this journey does not end with recertification.

“We are not satisfied at the level we are at,” says Ingvarsson. “We want to continue improving and be part of the development.”

The evolving standard plays a role in this, bringing new areas into focus and placing attention on topics that may not have been prioritized otherwise.

At the same time, the company is looking beyond its current applications. This includes exploring how paper can expand into new segments — particularly in packaging — where it can replace less circular materials and contribute to more sustainable product systems.

Turning Every Stone

What makes Lessebo Paper’s journey notable is not a single innovation, but a way of working.

It is a willingness to look closely — at materials, at systems, at relationships — and to treat improvement as an ongoing practice rather than a fixed goal.

“To find gold, you have to move every stone,” Ingvarsson says.

In a landscape where expectations are rising and transparency is becoming the norm, that mindset may prove to be one of the most valuable resources of all.