From Baldwin to Ayrshire, Plant Knows the Circuit

In the late 1950s, Baldwin Piano & Organ Co. opened several manufacturing facilities in the South and moved one plant from Cincinnati, Ohio, to Fayetteville.

From that time until 1984, the Fayetteville plant made electric pianos and organs for Baldwin. In the early ’80s, demand for such products was declining, so Baldwin diversified the Fayetteville plant by also doing contract electronics manufacturing there for other companies.

In the early 1990s, the local facility stopped making electric pianos and organs altogether and concentrated entirely on the contract electronics manufacturing. It was an easy transition.

“The organ is a big, wooden case with keys and a lot of circuit boards inside,” said Gary Lehren, senior vice president and general manager of the Fayetteville plant. “So it wasn’t hard for us to get into that.”

In January, Baldwin sold the 175,000-SF Fayetteville plant for $9.7 million to Ayrshire Electronics LLC, which is owned by Milo D. Bryant of Louisville, Ken. Bryant has two other electronics companies, but the Fayetteville facility is the only one under the name Ayrshire (the name of a street Bryant lived on).

With the sale, the plant added equipment to increase production.

“Our capabilities for output have almost been doubled from the equipment standpoint,” said Lehren, who began working at the plant 21 years ago as controller of Baldwin’s electronic organ division.

Ayrshire employees more than 300 workers in Fayetteville, most of whom assemble electronic circuit boards.

Citing confidentiality and competition, Lehren wouldn’t divulge the name of any of Aryshire’s customers. But he said products made at the Fayetteville facility “touch people’s everyday lives.”

The circuit boards and electo-mechanical assemblies made at Ayrshire go into heating and air-conditioning controls, exercise equipment, vending machines and even mail-sorting equipment, as well as many other products.

Gibson Guitar Corp.’s recent purchase of the rights to Baldwin from GE Capital had absolutely nothing to do with the Fayetteville plant, Lehren said.

The Gibson purchase did include two Baldwin plants in Arkansas — in Conway and Trumann — but those facilities manufacture acoustic pianos.

Baldwin, which is based in Mason, Ohio, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in May and laid off 30 workers. Baldwin owed GE Capital nearly $31 million at the time. Last month, GE Capital bid $17 million for Baldwin’s assets and agreed to sell them by Nov. 15.

Baldwin has been in business since 1862.