Retooled Shaw Plant Producing Hardwood Flooring

Chattanooga, TN, July 3, 2006--According to the Chattanooga Times Free Press, the Shaw Industries plant in South Pittsburg, Tennessee, which once produced nylon is up and running again, officials said recently. Plant manager Larry Pryor said company officials have retooled the plant and employees are now producing engineered hardwood flooring. Pryor said the plant began turning out flooring the third week of June. Up until that time, the plant was producing sample products, he said. "This is a first for Shaw," Pryor said. "The company has never produced hardwood flooring before." In August 2004, Shaw closed the South Pittsburg plant that produced spun nylon, idling almost 400 workers. Pryor said Shaw plans to hire about 100 workers for its new enterprise. Adding that many people to the payroll will help the area economy, South Pittsburg City Manager T.J. Landers said. "The new jobs will have a much greater effect to the local economy than just 100 jobs," Mr. Landers said. "Having people with money in their pocket to spend will help other area businesses." According to Mr. Landers, Shaw is offering its new employees $16.75 an hour to work at the new plant. The city is giving Shaw a tax abatement, Landers said. For the first five years of operation, Shaw will pay no property taxes to the city, according to city records. Shaw is investing $15.5 million in the first year of operation, he said. That figure includes $12 million in new machinery and about $3 million on the building. According to documents given to the city by Shaw, the company will have invested $50 million in the plant by 2009. "The job growth that this project brings to the community will certainly be a big boost to the local economy," Marion County Mayor Howell Moss told the Times Free Press in March when plans for the plant's reopening were announced.

Related Topics:Shaw Industries Group, Inc.

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