Mohawk, Cohoes, N.Y., USA, North America’s largest privately-owned manufacturer of fine papers, envelopes, and specialty substrates for commercial and digital printing, this week announced plans to operate a new state-of-the-art envelope manufacturing facility in the town of South Hadley, Mass., resulting in the creation of up to 40 new jobs. The announcement comes after the Massachusetts Office of Business Development Economic Assistance Coordinating Council voted unanimously to approve Mohawk’s application for a special tax assessment for a facility located at 28 Gaylord St. in South Hadley.

 

Mohawk entered into a seven year lease agreement on the 112,342 sq. ft. facility beginning yesterday, January 1.  Pending successful completion of the ongoing lease negotiation, construction is scheduled to begin early this month, and the facility is expected to be fully functional by the end of April.

 

"Our plan to create a new envelope converting facility in South Hadley represents our commitment to further growth of Mohawk’s envelope business," said Thomas D. O’Connor, Jr., chairman and CEO, Mohawk. "Since January 2014, we have committed to investments of nearly $5 million in new envelope converting equipment and facility upgrades, and the creation of 100 new jobs for skilled envelope workers. Our envelope business is vibrant, rapidly growing, and we are uniquely positioned to serve our customers with fast delivery, exceptional integrity, and the highest quality envelopes available in the industry," O’Connor continued.

 

Mohawk will invest up to $2 million to retrofit the South Hadley facility, including upgrades to electrical systems, installation of air and vacuum lines, and the purchase and installation of envelope converting and manufacturing equipment.

Mohawk expects to produce more than 500 million envelopes annually at the new facility. The site will also feature warehouse space to service the company’s customers along the U.S. East Coast and Mid-Atlantic regions, as well as overseas businesses.

 

"We selected the  South Hadley location because the layout of the building is ideal for our manufacturing needs, the site is essentially move-in ready and requires minimal construction prior to becoming operational, and there is an abundant pool of highly skilled envelope workers in Western Massachusetts," said Bob Scammell, Mohawk’s SVP, Strategy and Business Operations.

 

Approximately 40 new employees will be hired to staff the new South Hadley facility, which will operate five days a week, three shifts per day. 

Mohawk also owns and operates a 1 million sq. ft., state-of-the-art paper and envelope converting facility in Ashtabula, Ohio, which produces 1.5 billion envelopes a year. In early 2014, Mohawk grew its envelope operations at its Ohio facility by adding 75 new employees and expanding operations by investing millions of dollars in converting equipment upgrades.