THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, September 21, 1996 TAG: 9609210257
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY WENDY GROSSMAN, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 71 lines
Lillian Vernon just returned from a buying trip to Italy and Paris where, thanks to her warehouse in Virginia Beach, her international shopping spree was bigger and broader than usual. She was able to buy larger items: shelves, big baskets, cabinets and heavy wood chests.
``We couldn't do them before,'' Vernon said.
With matching scissors, Vernon and Mayor Meyera E. Oberndorf snipped the red felt ribbon Friday, opening a $15.7 million expansion that adds 335,000 square feet to Lillian Vernon's National Distribution Center in Virginia Beach.
The expanded warehouse will speed turnover on orders during peak sale seasons, said Chris Wendling, the project engineering manager for the distribution center.
``We weren't able to fill orders as efficiently as we would have liked,'' he said. ``Toward Christmas, when we get our push, we should be able to shave off a couple of days on service.''
The extra space will allow Vernon to put out new catalogs and sell larger merchandise.
``We can grow our business now,'' said David Hochberg, vice president of public affairs and Vernon's son. ``We were totally maxed out on space.''
In the expanded warehouse, boxes of personalized jack-o-lanterns glided over conveyer belts and then dropped down shoots to the five new shipping doors, where they're sorted and loaded into trucks.
``It's starting to get busy,'' Wendling said, walking between turquoise and red poles in the warehouse. ``We're at about half capacity. We'll pick up in November - 75 percent of our business is done in the three months prior to Christmas.''
Fans spin and conveyor belts whirred as metal clanked on the scuffed cement floor around him.
The expansion created 250 new jobs. In addition, the company will hire more than 3,000 seasonal associates to work in the warehouse. They've still got 1,500 jobs to fill by November.
This is the fifth expansion since Vernon located here in 1988. Vernon chose Virginia Beach because she can hire employees who are on the off-season from summer tourism. Plus, since it's a major port city, she can have boatloads of products shipped here from around the globe.
The warehouse is 48 feet tall - three feet taller than the old warehouse - and holds roughly 102,000 more boxes. The roofing and the deck were rated to withstand hurricane winds of 120 mph and greater, Wendling said.
``We had to beef up the structure.''
The center's expansion is not finished, though. There's a lot of empty space for more machinery and inventory. The company's still growing.
Hands clasped in front of her blue suit, Vernon smiled as she looked around the warehouse. Her dream is coming true, she says. An immigrant from Leipzig, Germany, she docked in Hoboken, N.J., in Oct. 17, 1937. In 1951, four months pregnant, she started the company from her kitchen table in Mount Vernon, N.Y., placing an ad in Seventeen magazine promoting monogrammed handbags and belts. Now she's got a company that brings in more than $238 million each year.
Customers include Hillary Clinton, Frank Sinatra, Steven Spielberg and Arnold Schwarzenegger
``I want to keep people out of the retail stores and get them into the catalog,'' she said. ILLUSTRATION: Color photos by BETH BERGMAN/The Virginian-Pilot
Lillian Vernon made a rare appearance Friday afternoon at the
opening of an expansion of her company's distribution center in
Virginia Beach. The $15.7 million expansion adds 335,000 square feet
and 250 full-time jobs, as well as 3,000 seasonal positions.
Lillian Vernon snipped the ribbon on the warehouse Friday.
KEYWORDS: LILLIAN VERNON EXPANSION by CNB