In August 2021, immediately following the announcement that Apogee Enterprises would soon close its Viracon plant in Statesboro, an executive with Cardinal Glass was thinking about future plans for his company.
“The day the closure was publicly announced, Kyle Peterson, who is president (of Cardinal’s Laminating Glass division) saw the news,” said Sabrina Vasher, human resources manager for the Statesboro plant. “Peterson was actually sitting down looking for places to build a new plant and saw the news. Cardinal did not realize the opportunity was out there to purchase the building and hire the team members until the announcement that Viracon was closing a location. He started immediately pursuing the plant.”
Moving quickly, Cardinal LG reached an agreement with Apogee to buy the plant in October, closed the sale in December and was able to keep the plant open and preserve jobs for about 175 workers at the plant.
“Every employee who wanted to continue working kept their job,” said Vasher, who started at Viracon in 2013 and has continued as the plant’s HR manager under Cardinal’s new ownership. “We are hiring and rebuilding. We’re in an exciting place right now.”
Since the purchase, Cardinal Glass has begun quickly moving forward with plans to repurpose the facility to support its residential glass business. Vasher said there are $10 to $15 million in capital improvements scheduled for the 400,000-square-foot plant in the coming months.
“I am excited about the future of Cardinal in Statesboro and the opportunities it will bring to the community,” said Plant Manager David Beecher, who was the plant manager for Viracon, as well. “The transition came with some challenges and a significant learning curve. We have an amazing and resilient team. We just get better every day. I am very proud of everything our team has accomplished in such a short period of time.”
Vasher described some of the improvements coming to the plant.
“We will primarily be a laminating plant,” she said. “It won’t be long until our laminating department is running 24/7. We will do some specialized cutting and customized tempering, as well, but they will be a small part of what we produce in Statesboro.
“The Statesboro plant is getting a hands free cut and temper line. Right now the processes are separate and require manual glass handling. The new lines will be highly automated and at the very least double our capacity.”
Vasher said one of the key reasons purchasing the Viracon plant was so attractive to Cardinal, is its highly skilled, trained and dedicated employees, which allowed the plant to hardly miss a beat in the transition from Viracon to Cardinal.
Vasher credited one local agency in particular with helping the company qualify for a $460,000 grant for training.
“By partnering with the Coastal Workforce Development Board and Janet Jones, the WorkSource Coastal Business Services representative helped us to provide the resources needed to make the transition smoother for our team members.”
In addition to the new cutting, tempering and lamination lines, Vasher said Cardinal is upgrading furnaces and adding a new packing inspection line, which will enable the plant to run more glass at a faster pace.
“Our focus is to produce as much glass as we possibly can,” she said. “The residential market is so hot right now. If we can make it, it’s sold.”
And, Vasher pointed out, produce it safely.
“In 2021, we had a record breaking year in safety with zero OSHA recordable incidents at the plant.”
With the capital and technology enhancements expected to come online in the next year or so, Vasher said the plant will be looking to hire more than 100 new employees, ranging from entry level workers to supervisors to engineers.
“When we are fully ramped up with all the improvements operating, I can see us up to 400 employees by this time next year,” she said. “But that’s also if we can hire the right employees and I’m confident we will.”