Roseburg Forest Products To Build New Engineered Wood Plant In South Carolina

Oregon-based Roseburg Forest Products will expand its operations in the southeastern United States with construction of a new engineered wood products plant in Chester, S.C. Roseburg publicly announced the project July 11 at a joint news conference with officials representing the state of South Carolina and Chester County.

“This is an exciting strategic growth opportunity in a business that has done well for us,” Roseburg President and CEO Grady Mulbery said. “With the continued increase in housing starts in the southeastern U.S., we see ongoing demand growth for engineered wood products in the region and elsewhere. We are grateful to state and local officials in Chester for their hard work and collaborative efforts to facilitate this project.”

Groundbreaking on the planned state-of-the-art manufacturing facility is expected in early 2018, with anticipated operation start-up in mid-2019. Once completed, the plant will create 148 full-time jobs.

“This new plant will be the most technologically advanced manufacturing facility of its kind in the world with the highest capacity continuous LVL press in the world,” said Steve Killgore, Roseburg’s Senior Vice President of Solid Wood Business. “Expanding our manufacturing capacity in this way allows us to meet growing customer demand for a versatile product that combines the best of modern processing technology and structural capability.”

The new plant will make Roseburg the largest U.S. manufacturer of engineered wood products serving independent distributors without captive distribution. Roseburg first established its engineered wood products business in 2001 and currently manufactures RFPI Joists, RigidLam LVL and RigidRim Rimboard at its plant in Riddle, Ore.