Wood company to bring 104 jobs

Incentives worth $2.5 million

A Canadian maker of particleboard and other wood products stands to receive more than $2.5 million in financial incentives for building a factory in Chatham County and hiring 104 workers over three years.

Uniboard Canada said Friday it will invest $142 million to buy and refurbish an existing facility in Moncure and build a new factory. The existing factory employs 146 people; the new factory will add 104. Uniboard makes wood products for flooring and furniture.

"We want to be the No. 1 company in engineered wood on the East Coast," said Richard Cuddihy, Uniboard's vice president for human resources.

The company qualified for an 80 percent property tax break worth as much as $2.1 million from Chatham County. Gov. Mike Easley's office is pitching in $250,000 in financial incentives in the form of a One North Carolina Fund grant. The state is also offering a 3J tax break valued at as much as $750 per job created, or $78,000. And Progress Energy is providing a price break on electricity of about 12 percent over five years.

Attracting a factory during an economic downturn is a big coup for the state, Easley said in a prepared statement. Uniboard had also considered competing sites in Georgia and South Carolina.

The 104 new jobs will pay an average annual wage of $45,303, not including benefits. The average annual wage in Chatham County is $29,588.

Uniboard is essentially moving a plant from Canada, Cuddihy said. The company, based in Montreal, also has a plant in Ohio and four in Quebec. The North Carolina facilities will put Uniboard within shipping range of Maryland and Florida as well as the Midwest, Cuddihy said.

The factories will supply a Pergo wood-flooring facility in Garner. Pergo and Uniboard are both subsidiaries of Pfeiderer AG, a German company.

Uniboard is looking to fill a variety of positions, including semi-skilled equipment operators as well as jobs in shipping, maintenance and management.