Two Companies Go The Greenfield Sawmill Route

Article by Rich Donnell, Editor-in-Chief, Timber Processing March 2017

Articles on large greenfield sawmills don’t come around too often (though we hope to have one on Biewer Lumber’s new mill in Newton, Miss. in the near future). For that matter stories about small greenfield sawmills aren’t very common either. Not many companies are into building greenfield sawmills these days—large or small.

Which makes this issue somewhat unique—because it includes articles on not one but two recently constructed small greenfield sawmills, which are about 2,800 miles apart. And both sawmills were built so that the respective companies could gain greater control over the green lumber raw material required for their finished production operations.

And if we’re going to continue to go with the adjective “unique,” let’s extend it to Fruit Growers Supply, a cooperative that has been around for 110 years. Fruit Growers Supply, which had gotten out of sawmilling in 1973, has recently built and started up a pallet stock sawmill in Yreka, Calif. Lumber from the new mill goes green to its pallet plant in Visalia, Calif.

The mill operates a CAE SL2000 (McGehee) small log profiler, which once ran in the sawmill at Pilot Rock, Ore. owed by Frontier Resources (Kinzua Resources). Frontier sold the mill to Boise Cascade in 2009. Our Western Editor Dan Shell visited and did an article on the Boise mill in 2012, right after Boise had removed the machine from its mill and sat it on the yard. Dan remembers seeing the piece under a tarp. Who knew that the next time Dan would see the machine would be when it was running at Yreka for Fruit Growers Supply?

The other article that actually received the big photo play on the cover is the Associated Hardwoods greenfield hardwood sawmill in Gaffney, SC. Associated Hardwoods doesn’t have 110 years under its belt, but is approaching 40, and has established itself as a top notch specialized hardwood lumber products company.

Associated Hardwoods is based in Granite Falls, NC, the site of a large concentration yard, including 18 dry kilns, an assortment of impressive lumber handling machinery and value-added sawing and gluing lines.

Through the years the company procured its green lumber from literally hundreds of suppliers along the Eastern Seaboard, but the recession of 2008 served as a wake-up call as some of those suppliers went away.

Wanting to establish more control over its green lumber supply, as well as bring in some new product opportunities (such as in white oak), Associated Hardwoods (led by President Rick Jordan) set out to build a sawmill. Jordan found willing partners in the city of Gaffney and Corley Manufacturing. Gaffney is an hour and a half drive from the Granite Falls operation—an easy-enough haul for Associated Hardwoods’ large trucking business.

Best of luck to Fruit Growers Supply and Associated Hardwoods in their sawmill ventures.