Pipe maker Colclasure Enterprises LLC said it will be ready in 2024 to open a plant in Selma, Ala., that the Colclasure family has been planning for years.
The $9 million renovation project of a building the family bought in 2018 is expected to create about 50 jobs over three years, according to Lyle Bollin, Colclasure's vice president of business development.
The company also plans to invest another $9 million during that time to install three extrusion lines, each with different capabilities: large- and small-coil pipe, and dual-wall culvert pipe, Bollin said in a Nov. 8 phone interview.
The company hopes to have the first two lines operating by May or June, Bollin said.
The plant will be Colclasure Enterprises' first, but the company is part of established firm C&L Tiling Inc. in Timewell, Ill. C&L also does business as Timewell Inc., Timewell Drainage Products and Services, and Ag Drainage Inc. (ADI) of Golden, Ill.
Don Colclasure was a founder of C&L Tiling Inc. in 1982 and launched what became known as ADI. He and his wife, Susan, founded Timewell in 1995.
Now their sons, Cory and Jake Colclasure, are starting up business in Selma. They will own the Selma plant, with Jake managing the facility while also acting as manager of Timewell's production lines. Cory will direct installations for all of ADI.
Don Colclasure had purchased the Selma facility in 2018, but held off on developing it due to the market and economic pressures, Bollin said. Also, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the companies had trouble sourcing material.
Like the family's other operations, Colclasure Enterprises will make corrugated high density polyethylene pipe for agricultural drainage, fittings and drainage tiles. But since the agricultural pipe market "hit a headwall" a few years back, the companies have expanded into commercial pipe markets to take advantage of growing demand in the South, Bollin said.
Bollin is also C&L's vice president of plant development and facilitation, and has done some sales work for ADI. Speaking specifically about the companies' growth in the South, he said: "We have been able to double our sales [there] every year for the past three years."
If sales continue at that pace, the company is looking at doubling the capacity of the plant in three to five years, which would double the workforce as well, Bollin said. The 40,000-square-foot facility currently sits on 20 acres.
"They're projecting [such an expansion] would take about 40 acres, and that's available," he added.
In addition to Timewell's Illinois plant, it operates facilities in Nashville; Sibley and Plainfield, Iowa; Jefferson, Wis.; Remington, Ind.; and Providence, Ky.