Booneville lands small manufacturing operation
by March 31, 2009 4:24 pm 68 views
American Spirit Wear announced Tuesday (Mar. 31) it will locate a new production facility and about 30 jobs in Booneville.
ASW is a wholesale supplier of jackets for sports, hunting and corporate and outwear, as well as special order for screen printers, embroiders and ad specialty. ASW sells more than 2,000 items and has approximately 6,000 customers.
The company will lease about 30,000 square feet in the former Today’s Plastics building that is now owned by Rockline Industries. Rockline, which employs about 135 in its Booneville operation, uses about 400,000 square feet of the building to manufacture and distribute wet wipes.
The jobs are being moved from El Dorado Springs, Mo.
“The move to Booneville provided for a larger manufacturing facility, a pool of quality, qualified employees and the opportunity to be more efficient to better serve our customers,” Terry Moore, President of ASW, said in a statement.
It’s been more than a year since Cargill announced it would not rebuild a processing plant destroyed in a March 2008 fire. The 150,000-square-foot plant employed more than 800.
Vanessa Wyrick, executive director of the Booneville Development Corp./South Logan County Chamber of Commerce, said recruiting ASW is part of an effort to target smaller employers.
“We are looking to replace those jobs (Cargill) with smaller manufacturers which will give us a more diversified economic base,” Wyrick said.
Wyrick said clean-up at the former Cargill site is almost complete. She is hoping the site results in future economic development announcements.
“We are hopeful that once the site is cleaned up and everything is finalized … that then we can work with Cargill to hopefully bring another company in to that location,” Wyrick explained.