Development of a highly loaded concentrate is leading Carolina Color Corp. to close a plant in Lancaster, Texas.
Production in Lancaster now will be moved to plants in Salisbury, N.C., and Delaware, Ohio, officials with Salisbury-based Carolina Color said in a recent news release.
The 55,000-square-foot Lancaster plant, which employs 24, will close Nov. 28, Carolina Color President Matt Barr said in a Nov. 4 telephone interview. The firm had operated the Lancaster site for about 20 years.
``We're taking care of our Lancaster employees with severance packages and retraining to help them take care of their families,'' Barr said. ``We're not just walking away.''
Some equipment already has been moved from Lancaster to Salisbury and Delaware. The Lancaster site now will be used for warehousing, but its ultimate fate has not been determined.
``We're doing this out of a position of strength,'' Barr said of the closing. ``We had extra capacity, and with energy costs and costs in general, it didn't make sense to operate all three sites.''
The product prompting the consolidation is G2, which officials describe as ``a patented pelletized product and process that is revolutionizing the colorant industry.'' Carolina Color ``has achieved explosive growth'' since the introduction of G2, officials said.
G2 bundles high loads of pigments in diverse commercial applications, including packaging, building applications and custom molding. The product can handle ultraviolet stabilizer loadings of 40-50 percent, even when combined with a 20-30 percent pigment loading.
``The concept of a highly loaded `super' concentrate has been around the industry for quite a while, but prior attempts have been unsuccessful,'' Barr said in the release.
Carolina Color does not release sales figures, but Barr said sales for 2008 should finish up 8-10 percent vs. 2007.
After the Lancaster closing, Carolina Color's work force will number about 60. The Salisbury and Delaware plants each have annual production capacity of about 15 million pounds.