Tag Archive for: Insites

Eternal Technology Corporation, a Taiwan-based manufacturer of dry film photoresist
materials, will locate a new facility in Chesterfield County. The Richmond metropolitan
area will gain up to 120 new jobs and more than $35 million in investment from the project
over the next several years.

Governor Jim Gilmore hailed them as the first major Taiwanese manufacturer to locate in
Virginia. “Eternal will be a welcome addition to the state’s growing high-tech
electronics manufacturing sector” he said.

Eternal Technology Corporation is a subsidiary of Eternal Chemical Company Ltd. that is
based in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. The Chesterfield plant will be their first United States
manufacturing facility. Eternal Technology will produce photoresist film that enables
printed circuit board manufacturers to produce extremely fine circuit patterns on
copper-clad laminated plates through a photo-imaging process.

“We chose Chesterfield County, Virginia because of its strategic business
location,” said Ying Kao, president of Eternal Technology Corporation. “We will
utilize Virginia’s excellent transportation infrastructure to carry our products and
we have great confidence in the state’s skilled workforce.”

The 65,000 square foot facility will be located in the Appomattox Industrial Center,
with immediate access to the new I-95/Walthall interchange. Eternal will also accrure
several state and county tax benefits by locating here which is part of a large Enterprise
Zone. The building plans provide for an additional 10,000 square feet of manufacturing
space which would bring the total investment up to $35 million.

This project was designated as FAST TRACK and the complex site plan received
substantial approval in 8 days. The process was expedited by several preliminary meetings
between the desgin/build contractor McKinney and Company and the county review staff.

Chesterfield County

Archived Article:
1997 Investment Announcements

Carter-Wallace, the manufacturer of Trojan brand condoms, will be constructing an additional 20,000 sq. ft to their existing facility in Appomattox Industrial Center. The new construction is needed to expand their production capacity.

Rehrig International, Inc., the world’s largest manufacturer of plastic shopping carts and wheeled, non-powered material handling equipment, will construct a new, 315,000 square feet manufacturing facility in the James River Industrial Center which is located in Chesterfield County. The company is a subsidiary of Cravey, Green & Wahlen, Inc. of Atlanta and is currently operating in Richmond. All of their 450 employees will relocate to the new, expanded facility.

Rehrig was founded in 1975 and began producing shopping carts and material handling equipment in the City of Richmond in 1975. The quality of their shopping cart products is known globally, and the company currently has sales worldwide in the supermarket industries.

The development team selected for this project include Panattoni Development, DPR Construction and Rose Architects.
The James River Industrial Center in Chesterfield County was chosen by Rehrig because of its convenient location, rail access, expandability and Enterprise Zone status.

According to Matthew Coyle, Project Manager, “Rehrig is excited about our opportunity in Chesterfield County. We have been a successful company in Virginia for many years and look forward to a long relationship. Without the help and support of the community and many of the local officials, Rehrig would be unable to accomplish this undertaking.”
He also added, “With this new facility, Rehrig will be able to double our current capacity.”

The company was assisted in their site location efforts by the Chesterfield Department of Economic Development.

Rogar International, employs about 35 people and manufactures gourmet kitchen products such as pot racks and wine bottle openers. The firms products are sold in more than 2000 retail outlets, from Wal-Mart to Neiman Marcus. Their new 50,000 square foot facility in Oak Lake Business Center should be ready in January 1999.

Rogar originally moved to the Richmond area in 1989 from Texas and began rebuilding their business that was killed by the Resolution Trust Corp. Since starting over here, Rogar’s business has grown steadily at about 10 percent a year.

In September, Rogar was named a winner of the 1998 Blue Chip Enterprise Initiative Award. The honor is sponsored jointly by MassMutual Life Insurance Co. and the U. S. Chamber of Commerce. The ward recognizes small companies that have overcome adversity to become stronger businesses.

Educators in Chesterfield County have been visiting area businesses and industry in an innovative effort by the public school system to develop closer ties to its business community. A special cadre of 71 ambassadors is making site visits, interviewing local managers and meeting with employees with children in the public schools. Ambassadors were hand-picked in the spring by school principals for their leadership and communication skills; in the ranks are classroom teachers, guidance counselors, and assistant principals.

During the summer months, each ambassador works with his or her assigned company and ultimately completes a written profile about that company for use by the school division. Included is information about entry-level jobs; workforce skills; awareness and impressions of school division performance; partnership potential; and opportunity for communicating with student’s parents at the work site. In return for their efforts, participating educators receive credit towards recertification.

Seventy-one businesses and industries are participating in the Chesterfield County Public Schools Ambassador Program, the first such effort of its kind. Participating companies were recruited by Chesterfield County Public Schools in cooperation with the assistance of the county’s economic development office and the Chesterfield Public Education Foundation. The emphasis of the program’s first year is upon industry, manufacturing and major employers in Chesterfield County. The program is intended to be an important mechanism for employer feedback and an invaluable opportunity for educators to become familiar with the business environment. Company profiles will be analyzed and followed-up by an interdisciplinary team within the school division as well as by an independent team from Virginia Commonwealth University.

All company profiles will be completed by September 4. Fifteen profiles are already available for review. The program is paying off; it has netted students summer jobs, resulted in new partnership relationships, and provided participants with an unparalleled professional development experience. For more information, please contact Lynn Wilson at 751-4736

Maruchan Virginia recently completed a 105,000 sq. ft. expansion of the warehouse at their processing plant in the Chesterfield Airpark. The total building size now exceeds 450,000 sq. ft. The company makes ramen noodle products and instant soups.

Sun Chemical is constructing a 54,000 sq. ft. manufacturing facility in the Appomottox Industrial Center in the Walthall area. The company is consolidating facilities that are currently located in the Richmond area into this new, state-of-the-art facility. The company will be manufacturing printing inks.

E & R Sales has purchased the vacant Safeway store in Market Square in Brandermill. Previously located in a 10,000 square foot facility in the Brandermill Trade Center, the purchase of this 35,000 square foot vacated grocery store allows E & R to expand their sales and warehouse capacity for their mylar balloon and pens business. The expansion also brings an additional 16 jobs to the area.

In addition to E & R Sales, the company opened a new business called Memories Galore, a scrapbooking store in this facility. Scrapbooking is the craft industry’s hottest trend and has become a $200 million industry.

The July issue of Money magazine rates the Richmond MSA as the best medium sized city in the south to live. In fact Virginia swept all three categories. Among metropolitan areas in the South with populations of 250,000 to 999,999, Richmond was ranked number 1.

According to Money magazine’s Website, money.com, the best places to live were determined in part by a phone survey of households nationwide. Those surveyed rated 37 livability factors on a scale of 1 to 10. A consultant then gathered information from a variety of sources, such as the FBI’s crime statistics and national housing prices, for the nation’s 300 largest metropolitan statistical areas.

“Once the survey and data were together, we crunched the numbers and gave each place a score based on how it fared on the quality of life factors,” the magazine said. “The things that Americans consider most important, like clean air and water, low crime, and good schools, received extra weight in the calculation.”

The Money article can be viewed here.

The BIGS Center at John Tyler Community College offers tailored training programs for business, industry and government agencies. Programs can be presented in your work place or at the college. Services offered include pre-employment training, on-going training programs, apprenticeship training programs and contract computer training seminars.

Pre-employment training:


In cooperation with the Virginia Department of Business Assistance’s Workforce Services Division, the BIGS Center will assist new or expanding companies in developing and presenting pre-employment training programs for prospective or screened applicants to determine their abilities, potential and cooperative attitude.

Support to Existing Industries:


The BIGS Center works with existing industry to develop on-going training programs. They will bring the training to you and develop it with your information. If confidentiality requirements exist, the BIGS Center and industry trainers will honor the need to protect company proprietary information. They will work with other Virginia community college to standardize your training needs at all your business locations throughout the Commonwealth.

Apprenticeship Training Programs:


In cooperation with the Department of Labor the BIGS Center can work with your company to establish an apprenticeship program. There are more than 500 various apprenticeship programs available in Virginia. An apprenticeship program can be designed for a business with their specific requirements and includes formal classroom training and documented work experience. For more information call (804) 861-2762

Contract Computer Training:


The BIGS Center offers one or two-day contract computer training seminars for software packages including Windows 95, Microsoft Office 97 (Word, Excel, Access, PowerPoint) WordPerfect 8 or 6.1, Internet, HTML, FrontPage and numerous others at any required user level. The BIGS Center can also provide computer software consulting support for businesses and state agencies.

Call the BIGS Center at 796-4041 to discuss how they can meet your company or organization’s workforce development training services. For a brochure call 796-4413 or visit the BIGS Center online at http://www.jt.cc.va.us/.