According to a recent report by the Triad Business Journal, Greensboro, N.C., USA, Packrite, a High Point, N.C.-based packaging firm that employs 78 people, will begin construction next month on a 70,000-sq. ft. addition to its existing plant as it expects to add 100 jobs during the next five years.

The expansion is part of a $9.5 million expansion that the High Point City Council approved $152,450 worth of incentives for in January. The company also is the recipient of a performance-based grant from the One North Carolina fund for up to $100,000. 

The estimated investment includes $2.6 million for construction of the addition at Packrite's 125,000-sq. ft. plant located at 1650 Packrite Court and about $6.9 million worth of equipment, including a 300-ft.-long Asitrade corrugated box former expected to arrive in November and be installed by year's end. Of the 100 jobs, 91 will be technical machine operators and helpers, shipping positions, scheduling positions, and maintenance positions, while nine jobs will be supervisors and managers. The average wage of the new jobs will be approximately $34,825.

N.C. Commerce Secretary John Skvarla said this past Tuesday that Packrite's expansion is part of what North Carolinians are all about, "especially North Carolinians from High Point because this city produces things, and that's what's going to return this state to absolute greatness because we know how to make things."

Packrite President Michael Drummond, whose wife Mary is the company's CEO, said the expansion is part of a goal to more than double in size, which in turn will allow it to help increase the tax base in High Point and provide high-skill manufacturing jobs in the community.

The expansion is being driven largely by demand for Packrite's high-graphic corrugated and microflute packaging needed for a wide and diverse range of products, including medical replacement parts, cameras, John Deere tractors, and liquor and tobacco products.

"We make Jack Daniel's boxes; we make Bacardi boxes," Drummond said. "Most people don't know we exist because we are in the background. We are not the guy out there beating his chest." Drummond hopes over the next decade to build Packrite into a $100 million a year business. "It's going to take a little bit of time, but that's my 10-year game plan," he said.

Drummond, who with Mary Drummond, started Packrite in 2008 with 18 people when the economy was falling apart, attributes growth to the company's proactive approach to business during the recession. When other companies pulled back, "Packrite choose to take that opportunity to expand and go forward," Drummond said. "And by doing that, people came to us because they felt that a company that was moving forward is the type of company that they want to be part of."