Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, January 23, 1992 TAG: 9201230068
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: B5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GEORGE KEGLEY BUSINESS EDITOR
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
SALEM PLANT TO EXPAND IN BOTETOURT
Capital Tool and Manufacturing Co., a small machine-tool maker in Salem, said Wednesday it will expand, building a Botetourt County plant with plans for a payroll of 250 employees within the next five years.The business, trading as CAPCO, announced construction of a $2 million plant that would be the first tenant in the new EastPark Commerce Center on Alternate U.S. 220, north of Bonsack.
By expanding during a recession, the company is taking a long-term view that business will improve, said Edward E. West III, CAPCO president.
After a soft market in the last half of 1991, he said, customers have released orders and business has increased since Christmas. Customers are looking toward increased production within six to 12 months, West said.
CAPCO began at College Park, Md., in 1940 and its founder, the late Joseph Dorr, moved it to Salem in 1972. The West family bought it five years later. CAPCO is owned by the family of Edward E. West Jr., head of an Ashland custom engineering company, and his son, Edward West III.
The company bought 13.5 acres in the 105-acre park on the former Densmore poultry farm at the foot of Coyner Mountain. VFP Inc. of Roanoke also is planning to move to the park, located behind the new Read Mountain Fire Station, a joint Botetourt-Roanoke county project.
CAPCO has 25 to 30 employees and could grow to a work force of 50 by the end of the year, its president said.
Salem contractor J.M. Turner & Co. has started work on the 50,000-square-foot plant, to be completed by July. CAPCO has been in a 16,000-square-foot building in the West Salem Industrial Park. That building has been sold, but West declined to identify the buyer.
The new plant, with offices in front of the production area, is designed so it can be enlarged in stages as the business grows, West said.
Workers at CAPCO make computerized machine tools, usually weighing from 6,000 to 100,000 pounds. They are used in the aluminum, steel, paper and printing industries across the country and some are shipped to South America and Germany.
Although orders were slow last year, West said customers' interest was high. He expects business to pick up as industrial companies gain more confidence and manufacturers continue investing.
West said he and many manufacturers would like to see Congress return to the investment tax credit as an incentive to expansion.
Highly skilled employees do work that is "not simple," he said.
Edward West Jr., his father, called the move to a larger building "a major commitment for us."
West III, a mechanical engineer, is the third generation of an engineering family. His grandfather started West Engineering, now at Ashland, in 1919 and his father runs it.