Barnwell, SC, February 23—-Norm Voss, president of laminate producer Kronotex USA, recently took South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford on a tour of the company's new 360,000-square-foot building.
The building is included in the company's $40 million Phase One construction which will employ up to 80 employees.
The building houses laminating and floor plank profiling lines capable of producing 200 million square feet of laminating flooring annually.
Voss said Phase Two construction will include construction of a medium-density fiberboard and high-density fiberboard core plant. Additional phases will include more laminating and flooring lines. Voss has estimated that at the end of Phase Two, total employment will reach 140 or more and that the company will invest approximately $135 million into the local economy.
The plant is able to manufacture the highest quality laminate flooring products, including embossed in-register surfaces and beveled edges.
Sanford said the company fit perfectly into the state's forestry-based economic base.
"We have an economic cluster built around atomic energy here in South Carolina with the Savannah River Site and the Chem-Nuclear site. In that same vein, I would argue that Kronotex is tied to a forestry cluster that we have in South Carolina," the governor said. "If you look at the chip that ultimately is used in that foreign product, it comes from these pine trees in this part of the state.
"And they have more uses for ... pure chip and saw timber. I think it's something that ultimately is advantageous to the local economy, so I think it plays very well to the forest-based component of our economy in this state."
