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WALLACE — An international corporation announced plans last week to locate its East Coast assembly and manufacturing facility in Wallace, bringing an investment of $6.7 million and initially 42 new jobs to town. Local officials say the potential is there for up to 500 jobs in the future.
Governor Roy Cooper made the announcement on Thursday, Dec. 5. “As the year comes to a close, I am excited to announce another great win for rural North Carolina,” Cooper said in a press release. “Our resilient workforce, affordability and quality of life are among the top reasons manufacturers are locating to this region of the state and we’re glad NexGen made the decision to locate Duplin County.”
NexGen Cabinets is a division of Honsoar International Ltd, a manufacturer of kitchen and bathroom furniture with a global production footprint in Malaysia, Vietnam, and Cambodia. NexGen will manufacture kitchen and bathroom cabinets for multi-family residential wholesale markets in North, Central, and South America. The location in Duplin County will be the first manufacturing site in the southeastern United States with a 150,000-square-foot space for assembly, production, and distribution operations.
The project has been in the works for just shy of a year, said Economic Development Director Scotty Summerlin. “They will be moving into an existing facility that’s been empty for a while,” he told Duplin Journal. “It’s 150,000 square feet that was previously unoccupied.”
The facility is the former home of JP Stevens, later known as SteveCo Knit, a longstanding textile manufacturer and major business in the town of Wallace from the 1950s through the 1990s. The plant is now known as the Duplin County Industrial Center, which totals 700,000 square feet, said Frank Efird of SVN Commercial Real Estate, one of the key players in bringing NexGen to Wallace.
There are a few other businesses in the former textile plant, including a metal roof manufacturer and a company that upfits public safety vehicles.
“I represent the owners of the Duplin County Industrial Center,” Efird explained. “We market to international companies as part of a global real estate franchise. NexGen was looking at multiple states, and we were able to introduce them to Wallace and Duplin County.”
Wallace Mayor Jason Wells and Wallace Town Manager Rob Taylor said the announcement came as a surprise to town officials, but they’re very excited. “It’s great news,” Taylor said. “It’s great to see something go into the old SteveCo Knit building.”
While NexGen will only operate in 150,000 of the total 700,000 square feet, the company locating its East Coast operations in Wallace is a huge get for the community.
“It’s a win-win for us,” the mayor said. “For somebody to invest that kind of money in our community and to bring their business to the old SteveCo Knit building, it fulfills our vision of bringing that building back to life.”
Plus, Wallace is one of the few towns that has the infrastructure in place to support a manufacturing facility of that size, Wells said. “Wallace is one of the places that can absorb that kind of growth,” he explained. “We’ve got plenty of water, we’ve got a sewer plant that can handle that kind of growth. We’re fortunate enough that we’ve got room to grow here.”
The building will have to undergo some changes to accommodate NexGen.
“We will be redeveloping the building from the top down,” Efird said, adding that the renovations will include new insulation, dock doors, LED lighting and more upgrades.
“It’s a team of people that are able to put together a grant like this,” Efird said. “There is so much competition.”
NexGen is a recipient of a $125,000 performance-based grant from the One North Carolina Fund. “The OneNC Fund provides financial assistance to local governments to help attract economic investment and to create jobs,” explained the press release from the governor’s office. “Companies receive no money upfront and must meet job creation and capital investment targets to qualify for payment. All OneNC grants require a matching participation from local governments and any award is contingent upon that condition being met.”
Efird said that NexGen’s assembly line will likely be complete in the first quarter of 2025, and that the company can start manufacturing shortly after that.
That means that the dozens of new jobs will be available early next year. Salaries will vary by position, but the average annual wage will be $50,462, above the county’s average salary of $45,722. According to the press release, the new jobs could potentially create an annual payroll impact of more than $2.1 million for the region.
In the future, Summerlin said, the company could potentially add 500 more jobs, as it establishes itself and grows.
“Working with our partners in state, county and local government has given our company the ability to bring jobs and opportunity to the area,” said NexGen COO Tom Boyda. “We look forward to long-term growth as we become part of the community.”
Efird credited Summerlin and Assistant County Manager Carrie Shields with being instrumental in bringing the project to Duplin County. “Scotty Summerlin has been able to work with companies like ours and get projects like this to Duplin County,” he said. “Scotty was instrumental in getting approval and support for this project. He and Carrie have done a super job.”
Summerlin said he and the county commissioners are “very excited” about the project coming to fruition and bringing a much-needed economic boon to the town of Wallace. “We expect more to come,” he added.
“Hopefully,” Wells said, “this kind of motivates other businesses to do the same. Hopefully, they’ll see the interest and say ‘why not Wallace?’”
