The Paper Mill Shop may be a recent phenomenon with a start date in 2000. However the Company can trace it’s ancestry back through five generations to 1845 and to a story of romance and love. It was in that year that the 22 year old James Cropper left his home city of Liverpool in passionate pursuit of a young woman named Fanny Wakefield who had stolen his heart and who had moved to the Westmorland town of Kendal. Later that year and with a new wife to support, James decided on a career in papermaking and took over the lease of Burneside Paper Mill just outside Kendal.

This mill, James Cropper plc, is still the source of the coloured and textured paper and card sold by The Paper Mill Shop. What’s more the tradition of papermaking in the Cropper family has been successfully handed through succeeding generations and the current Chairman of the Company, James Cropper is the great, great grandson of his namesake who founded the business over 160 years ago.

As the mill produced ever more specialised papers, it became clear that the excesses and offcuts from its vast range of colours would be ideal for sale to the general public if cut to A4 or A5 size. The idea for The Paper Mill Shop was born.

The growth of this retailing business led to TPMS in 2003 having its own conversion, picking, packing and distribution centre on the south side of Kendal. From here its 23 retail shops are managed, exciting new products are developed and customer orders to the new Internet site are handled.