BROWNVILLE — Following six months of losses, the owners of Brownville Specialty Paper Products Inc. announced Wednesday that they are closing the 1 Bridge St. plant and selling its product lines to two competitors.

The decision will leave 75 people out of work Friday, after the plant's last production run at 7 a.m.

Donald C. Alexander, who co-owns Brownville Specialty Paper with Richard C. Howland and F. Gene Rood, blamed the closure on the skyrocketing costs of fuel, electricity and raw materials, used in copious amounts by the company.

The owners informed employees Tuesday that the plant would close by the end of the week. Mr. Alexander described the decision as "gut-wrenching" and said many employees were in tears following the announcement.

"We had hoped to find other solutions," Mr. Alexander said. "It's not a choice any of us would like to make. It's a choice we are forced to make."

FiberMark North America Inc., Brattleboro, Vt., which has plants in Brownville and Lowville, has acquired the plant's pressboard business, while Climax Manufacturing Co., Lowville, took over the Graphic Arts and Cap Closure product lines.

Brownville Specialty Paper's closure comes a month after the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration fined the plant $116,250 for 35 safety violations.

The plant had come under OSHA scrutiny after the death of Scott M. Ellsworth, 26. He was killed Dec. 5 when a 5,000-pound roll of industrial-grade paper backer came off a machine and landed on him.

Last month, Christopher R. Adams, OSHA's area director in the Syracuse office, said the death could have been prevented if the machine conformed to the agency's safety standards.

On Wednesday, Mr. Alexander said Mr. Ellsworth's death and the OSHA citations "had little bearing on the decision" to close.

In the last six months, Mr. Alexander said, plant expenses had increased exponentially, with energy costs rising by 130 percent and raw materials by 40 percent to 50 percent. He said fuel, used in the shipment of the plant's paper products, also had increased.

"It is impossible for any business of our size, that are high, intense users of energy, to pass those costs along to our customers," he said. "It makes trying to generate enough profitability in order to operate the business nearly impossible."

This is not the first time the Brownville plant, which manufactures different types of specialty grades of paper, has shut down. After Boise Cascade closed the plant in 1988, the current three owners purchased the business and reopened it in 1991.

In 17 years since then, Mr. Alexander said, the plant has experienced multiple fires and floods, but had always managed to rebuild and survive.

Mr. Alexander praised his employees for their hard work and endurance, describing them as "friends and damn near family for us."

"We think we gave it our best effort," he said. "It wasn't the people's fault there."

He said orders at the plant had remained high, as had the quality of its products. Even with a backlog of orders, the plant had been losing money for the last six months, he said.

With the three owners reaching retirement age, Mr. Alexander said, it had become increasingly difficult for them to respond to the increasing economic demands of the company by reaching into their own pockets.

"We thought the best way to deal with this was to sell our proprietary information and products to a couple of good, local companies, who will do something with those product lines," he said.

The purchase of the pressboard line comes as a vindication for FiberMark, which sued Brown-ville Specialty Paper in 2002 for trademark infringements.

FiberMark claimed its competitor had been producing "knock-off" pressboard on inferior products and was creating unfair competition.

Although a jury initially ruled in favor of Brownville in three of four contested issues, awarding FiberMark $1 in damages, a federal judge in 2006 ordered Brownville Specialty Paper to stop producing a mottled pressboard like one made by FiberMark.

In a press release Wednesday, FiberMark president and CEO Anthony MacLaurin said his company was "well suited to merge BSPP's business into its portfolio."

"We will also serve Brown-ville's customers by providing continuity of supply to the market," he said. "This transaction is another positive step in FiberMark's strategy to expand and strengthen the business."

FiberMark officials did not return calls requesting further comment.

A Climax official said the company essentially had agreed to buy customer lists from its former competitor. Climax, which has 262 full-time employees, operates a papermaking mill at 30 Champion St. in West Carthage, a paperboard division in Lowville and a warehouse facility in Syracuse.

Jill E. Boliver, a human resources director at Climax, said the acquisition, whose terms were not disclosed by any of the three companies, was expected to increase Climax's business in both Graphic Arts and Cap Closure by about 25 percent.

"First of all, it was very unfortunate that Brownville had to go down; we feel for those people that are losing their jobs," she said. "We're happy that we were able to help them with the purchase of this product line, at least, to continue servicing customers."

Ms. Boliver said the company plans to hire some of the Brownville Specialty Paper employees and will determine the number of people they need once the increase in sales becomes clear.