A NEW manufacturing site which cost £6 million has been officially opened by a government minister.

Business minister Baroness Judith Wilcox visited Accrol Papers in Blackburn to unveil the expansion.

Founded in 1993, Accrol Papers has grown substantially in recent years to produce over one million toilet rolls and 250,000 kitchen rolls per day.

The firm, based in Davyfield Road at Roman Road Industrial Estate, Blackburn, has also increased the number of people it employs from 100 to around 180.

And now it has added a 120,000 square foot building to its operation, taking its factory space from around 180,000 square feet to nearly 300,000.

Tim Bullough, commercial director, said: “We buy in tissue in big rolls and we put the rolls onto a machine and that converts them into toilet rolls and kitchen rolls.

“We’ve just bought a new unit in Roman Road and we’re now the largest independent converter of tissue in the UK and the fourth largest in the UK overall.

“We’re putting on probably around £10-£15million turnover per year.”

While most manufacturing firms have seen their margins squeezed in the economic downturn, Accrol has spent the recession notching up exponential growth and rapid expansion.

And the firm, which was founded in Accrington in 1993, has also invested heavily in its workforce, buying new uniforms for its staff.

Mr Bullough said: “In the last couple of years we’ve started placing even more emphasis in investing in staff because obviously without the staff we have no business.

“We’ve spent a lot of money on training and we’ve even got people coming out from Italy to train staff on how to use the machines on a regular basis, to maximise the productivity of the machines. We have other general training initiatives as well.

“We rebranded a while ago and the new uniforms are part of the rebranding exercise.