Georgia Made Success Stories
Read how Georgia Made manufacturing companies have found economic development success across the state.
Read how Georgia Made manufacturing companies have found economic development success across the state.
Rinse Bath & Body, Eaglecraft Door, and Poriferous, Inc. are three of Georgia’s six 2022 Small Business ROCK STARS, recognized by the Georgia Department of Economic Development (GDEcD) and the Georgia Economic Developers Association (GEDA) as outstanding, unique, and impactful small businesses in the state of Georgia.
“We saw a need, it was urgent, and we knew we could help,” says Jason Womack, founder and president of Commercial Stainless Fabricators (CSF) in Marietta, Georgia, which makes air purifiers. That’s the sentiment echoed by many companies in the state that have started, pivoted, or stepped up production to combat the COVID-19 pandemic while maintaining or even increasing operations and employment. Thanks to their efforts, the state and its people are well-positioned to resume the lives they knew before the pandemic.
Uprooting and moving an entire manufacturing operation is not for the faint of heart. Unless the results mean greater profits, the time and expense of searching for a more advantageous location, constructing a new facility and training a new workforce—all while incurring a profit-risking gap in production time—can often be better spent enhancing existing resources.
A tequila plant in Mexico. A COVID-19 hospital in Saudi Arabia. A turkey farm in North Carolina. A brewing company in Africa. These are just a few of the diverse operations powered by customized boilers made by Georgia-based Hurst Boiler & Welding.
What do the endangered gopher tortoise and the paint ingredient zircon have in common? The mineral-rich sandhills of southeast Georgia are home to both.
Hard work, fast response and tightly knit partnerships helped Georgia win Kia Motors’ first auto manufacturing plant in the United States.
You may not realize it, but the car you’re driving may have parts made in the city of Monroe, Georgia. For 23 years, Hitachi Automotive Systems Americas, Inc., a Tier 1 supplier of world-class products to the global automotive market, has been manufacturing and shipping automotive parts to customers including Ford Motor Company, General Motors, Nissan, Subaru, and Honda, across the U.S., Mexico, Canada and around the globe, direct from the town of Monroe.
Seamless intergovernmental cooperation. It’s this intangible quality that helps Georgia companies grow and thrive. It helped convince industrial giant Kubota to establish its North American manufacturing base in the state of Georgia and then expand to multiple locations in the state over the last 32 years. Over that time, the company’s workforce has grown from 38 people to almost 3,000.
The “Cycle of Goodness: no one prospers without rendering benefit to others.” It’s not just YKK’s corporate philosophy, it’s how the manufacturer operates. From ramping up its production of fasteners for protective gear in the fight against COVID-19, to creating intercultural youth education opportunities, YKK’s North American entities contribute to communities where they are deeply rooted. And it’s no accident that those communities are in Georgia.
When opportunity is all around you, you pay attention. If you’re Danny Faircloth and you grow up amid 300,000 acres of trees, you harness every single bit of this natural resource to build a thriving and sustainable family-owned business from the ground up.
Essential products that purify, protect and enhance our world are being produced today by Georgia men and women who have acquired the necessary skills thanks to workforce training programs like Georgia Quick Start. These talented folks are employed by companies around the state, including global automotive supplier Ingevity, which has operated a plant in Waynesboro, Georgia since 2002.
To most of us, the word “ecosystem” conjures up visions of nature: an intricate biological landscape of plants, wildlife and the weather that helps them thrive. But it can also mean a complex, interconnected and interdependent business system, and it’s that kind of ecosystem that has helped Takeda thrive in Georgia.
High-quality, working appliances have never been more vital than during a time when making a home-cooked meal and sanitizing dishes are important to American households. Roper Corporation, a subsidiary of GE Appliances, a Haier company, embraces this mission and during the pandemic, continues to supply the country with major cooking appliances manufactured at its Walker County, Georgia, plant.
The “official sport of social distance” during the COVID-19 pandemic is golf, according to the Washington Post. It’s little wonder, then, that Bridgestone Golf USA, based in Covington, Georgia, for the past 30 years, experienced record production and sales in 2020. The increased popularity of the sport, in addition to the company’s leadership in the industry and its innovative products, recently compelled Bridgestone to increase its production capacity to 30% and workforce by 20% to satisfy strong consumer demand.