In 1887 Daniel M. Bare founded the Roaring Spring Blank Book Company to produce ledgers, journals, etc., hence the name ‘Blank Book’. Today the company has grown from a 20 person operation in a small two story brick building to over 250 employees in 400,000 square foot of modern manufacturing and distribution facilities that produce a variety of school and office paper products.
This year celebrates Roaring Spring Blank Book’s (now Roaring Spring Paper Products) 125th Anniversary of commitment to excellence and a staple of the Blair County community. “We are truly honored to have this family owned local business as part of our business community for the past 125 years and we look forward to the next 125,” said Marty Marasco, President/CEO of ABCD Corp.
Roaring Spring Blank Book is now one of the largest independently owned producers of school and office supplies. Special high speed equipment not only produces notebooks, pads, and tablets, but construction paper, poster board, and pocket folders. Complimenting the production equipment is an in-house printing operation that provides fast service and assures
consistent quality for the numerous direct order print jobs received from private customers such as colleges and universities.
Through five generations and more than 100 years Roaring Spring Blank Book Company has grown from a hand-full of customers to thousands of accounts nationwide. “This company has always had a committed work force and management team, and that is why we survived,” said Daniel Hoover, President/CEO of Roaring Spring Paper Products. “A representative of our family has always been very active in the business. Very few companies last five generations. We all had to work for a living and still do. There have always been active members wanting the company to succeed long term,” Hoover added.
The company also has two other divisions – Spring Cove Container, which was started in 1964 to manufacture corrugated shipping containers, and Roaring Spring Water, which was started in 1981. The three divisions employ about 380 people; the paper products division is the largest, employing about 250 people.
Hoover said the company is one of the larger, independently owned ruled product manufacturers in the United States. Today, the company churns out more than 20 million notebooks a year and produces a large quantity of private label notebooks for companies such as CVS Drug Stores and Staples.
“What is successful this year may not be successful next year. You have to create more opportunities for your company. We have to re-invent ourselves over and over again. If we had not done that, we may not have survived,” Hoover said.
