1. society
2. unrest and war

Southern Textile News
February 4, 2008
1 STN
welcomes SYFA/FSG Sustainability Conference attendees
Vol. 64, No. 3, Issue No. 2413
www.textilenews.com
February 4, 2008
TEXTILE SOUTH EDITION
Spinning the products of IMAGINATION
In the
Loop
Think green
It’s almost time for the
“Sustainable is Attainable:
Redesigning the Textile
Industry” conference,
organized by the Synthetic
Yarn and Fiber Association
(SYFA) and the Fiber
Surface Group (FSG). The
event, which is expected
to draw hundreds, is
scheduled for Feb. 12-13
at the Sheraton Airport
Plaza in Charlotte, NC. To
register, contact Kim Pettit
at [email protected] or at
704-824-3522. See page 2.
To wit
“It’s like the patient is
bleeding and they’re
waiting to see if
they should apply a
tourniquet.”
Chairman Martin Foil Jr. (L) and President Peter Hegarty spearhead Tuscarora
Yarns. Read its success story beginning on page 5.
Photos by Devin Steele
— Robert Chesebro,
president of Wigwam
Mills, Inc., Sheboygan,
WI, responded to CITA’s
decision to move forward
with safeguard action
against cotton socks
imported from Honduras,
as quoted by Gannett News
Service. See story, page 14.
Milliken’s Allen to retire; Salley promoted
SPARTANBURG, SC —
Dr. Ashley Allen will retire as
president and CEO of Milliken
& Company, effective May 1,
board chairman Roger Milliken
announced Jan. 24.
Allen, who will retire after his
65th birthday, has led Milliken
in those positions since 2005.
Prior to his current position he
served as chief operating officer
n FORTUNE magazine has
ranked Milliken & Co. No. 92 on
annual “100 Best Companies to
Work For” list. Story, page 14.
Plastic
Bobbins,
Tubes
&
Cones
Allen
Salley
and in several leadership positions over his 38-year career,
including president of Milliken’s Chemical Division.
Concurrent with Allen’s retirement, the board of directors
has appointed Dr. Joe Salley to
replace Allen. Salley will assume
the president and CEO positions from his current position
of chief operating officer.
“Joe Salley inherits the big
shoes of Ashley Allen, who has
provided tremendous leadership
to this private manufacturing company,” Milliken said.
“In elevating Joe to the CEO
leadership role, we are happy
to again be promoting from
within, which is testimony to
Milliken’s commitment to recruit, educate, challenge and
Continued on page 14
... Plastic Bobbins, Tubes & Cones
Provided to Customer Specifications in
a Wide Variety of Sizes, Shapes, Surface
Colors and Other Options to Meet
Varying Machine Requirements.
P.O. Box 518, Gastonia, NC 28053
Telephone (704) 865-1201 Fax: (704) 866-5258
E-mail: [email protected]
The Southern Textile
Association thanks the
following companies for
enabling us to provide the
industry 100 years of
exemplary service!
This week, we salute:
n Carolina Cotton Works, Inc.
n Custom Technical Solutions, LLC
n Diversco, Inc.
n Frankl & Thomas, Inc.
n Graf Metallic of America, Inc.
n Lang Ligon & Company, Inc.
n PSP Marketing, Inc.
n The Quantum Group, Inc.
Southern Textile Association
PO Box 66
Gastonia, NC 28053-0066
(704) 824-3522
www.southerntextile.org
2
Southern Textile News
February 4, 2008
“A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and
philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He
may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall.”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
E
merson’s words, from his essay, “Self-Reliance,” could easily apply to Tuscarora Yarns, the big little textile company in Mount Pleasant, NC. Except for
givens such as color, quality and service, the yarn spinning company has eschewed
consistency for much of its 109-year history — or at least in the last 40, under the
leadership of chairman and CEO Martin Foil Jr. That is to say, it has continually
reinvented itself to avoid the comfort-zone trap — a place in which, perhaps, many
textile companies have found themselves during this globalization tide.
One thing we’ve learned during our extensive interviews with Tuscarora officials
for our Textile South edition is this: The company is one of the most progressive
we’ve ever seen, in textiles or otherwise. Define it as you like — cutting edge, out
of the box, forward thinking — but understand that Tuscarora is enjoying great
success in a world that’s not been so kind to many of its domestic brethren.
As you can read in these pages, the company was one of the first to realize that
one day, the goose that had laid the golden egg for so many years would be cooked.
So it began to explore the world of exporting and, in the late ’80s, formed with
more than three dozen other U.S. yarn spinners the American Textile Export Company (AMTEC). And for nearly two decades now, Tuscarora has sold its products
abroad. Through hard work and a dedication to this mission, the company has
constantly found new markets for its yarns. In another ground-breaking move,
the company was one of the first to call on retailers directly and such downstream
thinking has proven effective.
An inconsistent
truth
The fruits of the aforementioned steps, of course, could not have been possible without Tuscarora’s ability to produce a coveted product. And it has done so
through its commitment to and investment in machinery, technology, processes
and people.
Not to mention its consistent inconsistency.
T
he top two executives at Tuscarora Yarns of Mount Pleasant, NC, aren’t
exactly two peas in a pod.
After all, Chairman Martin Foil Jr. is a Southern American industrialist and
President Peter Hegarty is a worldly British sophisticate.
At first blush, Foil comes off as a gruff, no-nonsense, humorless man of big
stature with a booming voice and an opinion on everything; Hegarty as a polished,
dapper, articulate man of reserved countenance and playful spirit.
But beneath the surface, you’ll find in Foil an affable, erudite teddy bear with a
bent for jest — and, in Hegarty, someone who can roll up his sleeves and devour a
North Carolina barbecue sandwich as well as any Tar Heel around.
And you should see ’em together.
At appropriate times, they play off each other like a comedy duo. And when it’s
time to get down to business, they work with a sense of gravity and shared purpose,
though they occasionally disagree.
Their exchanges often oscillate between matter-of-fact discourse and waggish
banter. For instance, answering a question about the Foil’s management style and
the company’s culture during a recent interview, this repartee occurred:
Hegarty: “The good thing about Martin is he listens to what we have to say. He
doesn’t always agree with us and we don’t always agree with him. It’s not a dictatorship. It’s teamwork and that’s a very, very big key to what we do.”
Foil: “The other thing is it’s a week lost if he doesn’t get fired at least three times
a week.”
Hegarty: “I really get fired every day.”
Together, they make quite a team. As leaders of a small but global yarn production company, they have created a vision and led the company to a great level of
achievement during these challenging times.
Hegarty and Foil also share mutual admiration for the other. Hegarty is particularly enamored with Foil’s right-brain aptitude, which one may not typically see in
an analytical, rational person such as Foil.
“Martin is so creative,” Hegarty said. “He’s definitely our driving force in creativity. He’s 74 years old and he’s seen every trend you can think of in the textile
industry, so he knows what’s going to come back around. Martin has this ability
and great color sense. He has a vision of putting a product together and putting
colors together like no one I’ve ever seen.”
But one of Foil’s traits is a little nettlesome to Hegarty, he said.
“One of the biggest problems I have with Martin is his memory,” he said with
Yin
&
Yang
a mischievous smile. “You know, he’s getting old now and you worry about his
memory. But the problem is not that he has a bad memory — he remembers
everything.”
Foil hired Hegarty full-time in 2001 when Tuscarora became majority owner of
the company Hegarty led, American Textile Export Co. (AMTEC), a cooperative
owned by a number of U.S. yarn spinning companies. Having worked with him for
several years, Foil knew that Hegarty would bring plenty of international acumen
to the table as the company boosted its export business, he said.
“Peter is a consummate salesman and a good politician,” Foil said. “If you’re going
to make profits, which is the key to staying in business, then you have to take those
roads and unlock those doors to get there. Peter’s a big key to that. He’s extremely
good at what he does. He’s the best I know. But everybody has an Achilles heel.”
Foil then hollered down the hall at Hegarty: “We’re not going to lunch. To heck
with you.”
He then turned and, in a hushed voice, said: “I think we gee haw all right together.”
3
Southern Textile News
February 4, 2008
TEXTILE SOUTH EDITION
BIG LITTLE TEXTILE COMPANY
Tuscarora Yarns: A global success story
M
MOUNT PLEASANT, NC
— Tucked in a small town with
an inviting name, you’ll find
the nerve center of a global success story.
A textile manufacturer.
Based in the U.S.
Bucking the trend.
Wind north through the
main drag (don’t blink) of
the Cabarrus County town of
Mount Pleasant (pop. 1,425)
and you’ll pass a barbecue joint,
a curbside hamburger stand and
a mechanic’s shop before reaching the modest headquarters of
Tuscarora Yarns.
But don’t be fooled.
Inside, you’ll find some of the
brain trust — those who aren’t
out plumbing new business opportunities in various parts of
the world — of a 109-year-old
yarn production company that
continues to find new ways to
thrive in a challenging economic environment for American
textile manufacturing.
Indeed, an anomaly of sorts.
But to hear its story, you’ll
realize that Tuscarora’s success
hasn’t occurred through happenstance. And it comes from
more than just hard work, quality, consistency, fast turnaround
and service. Those are all givens in today’s fast-paced, 24/7
world.
Flexibility, customization,
creativity, innovation, investment, new market and niche
exploration, downstream involvement, a team culture and
smart, loyal employees all figure
into the company’s ability to
differentiate itself from U.S.
textile manufacturers its size.
And it starts at the top.
Chairman Martin Foil Jr.,
74, who has headed Tuscarora
Yarns since 1968 and has been
involved with the company in
some matter or form since he
was a pre-teen, has spent his
life thinking forward and holding an unwavering conviction
that a strong manufacturing
base is good for America, say
those who know him. And that
philosophy has transcended his
office and is prevalent throughout the company, which has
enabled Tuscarora to remain
on the cutting edge during
ever-evolving times, according
to company President Peter
Hegarty.
Moreover, the company is
“staying out of the way” of bigvolume commodity producers
in China, India, Pakistan or
wherever, Foil said.
“We want to be the whipped
cream and the cherry on top of
the sundae,” he said.
Located just five miles from
Reed Gold Mine, where gold
was first discovered in America,
Tuscarora Yarns has continually spun yarn into gold, so
to speak, regardless the global
pressures or the business cycle.
Or, as the company so aptly
puts it in its motto: “Spinning
the Products of Imagination.”
A strong balance sheet combined with virtually no debt
and an aggressive growth strategy make Tuscarora Yarns — in
many respects, the biggest little
U.S. textile company around —
an easy choice as our Featured
Company in this, our 20th annual Textile South edition.
Key attributes
Privately held Tuscarora
Yarns is a three-plant, 300-employee company that produces
100 percent cotton, synthetic
and blended yarns manufactured both open end and ring
spun for a variety of applications. They include men’s and
women’s sportswear, hosiery,
sweaters, home furnishings,
automotive and more.
Tuscarora Yarns is the largest
manufacturer of cotton heather
and mélange yarns in the U.S.
and the only Supima-licensed
spinner of heather yarns in this
hemisphere. Its yarns are sold
in end products at the mass
market level to the private label
level and are found in such top
brands as Victoria’s Secret, Liz
Claiborne and Ralph Lauren,
to name a few.
Driven by an export-oriented
mentality, the company has
and continues to use a hemi-
spheric strategy — encouraged
by certain free trade deals,
particularly the Dominican
Republic-Central America Free
Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA)
— to its benefit. About 40
percent (and growing) of Tuscarora’s business is exports,
Hegarty said.
The company views its competition as burgeoning niche
players in Asia, particularly
China, and not the guy down
the street, Hegarty said. And its
top forte is innovation, he said,
defining that as, “the ability to
create new products that create
demand.” And it does so with
quality and in quick-turn fashion, he added.
A number of other attributes
have factored into the company’s success, Hegarty said.
Tuscarora:
• was one of the first companies to do business in Mexico
and Central America and today
is one of best-known textile
companies working those regions;
• was one of the first companies to call on retailers directly;
• is “peerless” in color cre-
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Southern Textile News
Continued from previous page
ation and color matching,
thanks to its unique R&D facility; and
• uses state-of-the-art machinery and technology for the
most efficient production of the
highest-quality products.
In a nutshell, all of this relates to the company’s strategy
— and the supply chain’s demands — for fast turnaround,
Hegarty said.
“We try to maintain our
deliveries within a two- or
three-week time frame,” he
said. “You have to be able to
maintain that because the pressure is on from the retailers.
They want it faster all the time.
Our customers feel that pressure and they put the pressure
back on us — and we have to
have the ability to do that.”
A creative resource
A perusal of Tuscarora’s website and “capabilities brochure”
for customers, potential customers and designers, along
with a tour of its showroom,
reveals that the company views
itself as much more than a yarn
producer.
February 4, 2008
TEXTILE SOUTH EDITION
In the printed piece, words,
concepts, images and design
all collaborate to send a message that Tuscarora is more of
a creative resource than a mere
manufacturing company. Also
available in Spanish, the brochure emphasizes color and
creativity, accentuated by the
inclusion of some of Monet’s
paintings and such inspiring
phrases as, “If you dream in
color” and “Just Imagine It.”
Such thematic elements
also resonate throughout the
company’s website (www.tuscarorayarns.com), which is
available in English, Spanish,
Chinese and Korean.
And that’s just an introduction.
Walk through the company’s
showroom and you’ll likely be
impressed by the depth and
breadth of products — not
yarn packages, but actual end
products made with Tuscarora
yarns. Apparel and fabrics of
various colors, yarns, blends,
brands, styles, etc. are available
to see and touch, which only
serves to reinforce, subliminally
perhaps, Tuscarora’s image as a
big-picture company.
“This showroom has been
a tremendous success for us,”
Hegarty said. “I don’t think
you’ll find many spinning companies that have a showroom
like this with product that we
can pull off the shelf. Anytime
we can get a customer to come
into this showroom or go to
our Oakboro mill [more on
that later], I guarantee we’re
going to sell them.”
Why such a showroom? “We
decided that we had to be proactive rather than reactive in
presenting our product,” he
said.
Tuscarora has a mini-manufacturing center complete with
testing and knitting machines,
enabling the company to test the
quality of its yarns in a fabric before being sent to the customer.
“We figured we might as well
make some garments out of this
fabric so we can show people
what our product looks like
in the actual garment, rather
than just putting a cone of yarn
on the desk and saying that’s
what we make,” Hegarty said.
“Then we decided the retailers
were the first ones who need to
see the product, so we were the
first spinner to start calling on
retailers.”
Creating “up-market garments,” he added, has led to
business opportunities.
“It’s been tremendous because people will say, ‘this is
fantastic. Who can make this
for me?’ And we’ll say, ‘where
do you want it made? Do you
want it made in America? Do
you want it made in Guatemala? Wherever you want it
made. And we have a list of our
customers who can make it for
them.”
Color-matching lab
Tuscarora’s color-matching
lab also sets Tuscarora apart,
according to Foil.
“In the lab, designers can
spend a couple of days and do
a whole year’s line of colors and
yarn for fabric and go away
with everything done,” he said.
“We don’t have a peer in that
business, and that would include everybody — the Chinese
and the rest of the world.”
Being able to match customers’ colors and provide quick
turn is significant, Hegarty
added.
“We can actually turn
around a color submit within
24 hours,” he said. “A customer
can send in a color match and
we can turn it around and have
a knitted piece of fabric back
to them in the color they’re
looking for. We have a great
customer service staff who is
bilingual and a great planning
group within the mills who has
the ability to provide those deliveries on a quick notice.”
Hot products
Lab technician Renee Buller (top photo) works on a knitting
machine, while Kristina McCraw (bottom) tests yarn in the
corporate lab area.
Photos by Devin Steele
Tuscarora’s product line is
quite impressive and too extensive to list here. In its literature,
the company tells customers,
“if you can imagine it, we can
create it.” And it does, from
cotton acrylic heather yarn to
dyed cotton mélange yarn to
bamboo yarn to cotton polyester mock twist yarn.
“The beauty of what we do is
we can do any blend, any kind
A framed illustration of a native American hangs in
Tuscarora Yarn’s conference room.
Photo by Devin Steele
‘Tuscarora’ a tribute
to American indians
I
n August 1899, a group of businessmen gathered here to
build a cotton mill to “provide able and secure employment for the residents of the area.”
The original building still stands, the bricks were made by
hand on site. The name for the new mill, Tuscarora Cotton
Mill, was suggested by the company secretary, Paul Barringer. He was, according to company records, an authority on
American Indian history.
The Tuscarora tribe of American Indians lived in villages
along the rivers of what is now North Carolina. They were
hunters, farmers, fishermen and traders. There were an estimated 5,000 Tuscarora Indians living in Eastern North
Carolina in 1600. Located mostly in the region between the
Neuse and Pamlico rivers, they first encountered the English
in 1650.
The name “Tuscarora” is derived from an Iroquois term
for “hemp gatherers.” The Tuscarora were also referred to as
“shirt-wearing people.”
From 1713 to 1803, they migrated northward into Virginia, West Virginia, Pennsylvania and New York. In 1722,
they were the last Indian nation named to the great Iroquois
League, which is comprised of the Onondaga, Oneida, Seneca,
Cayuga, Mohawk, and Tuscarora. Many supported the colonists during the American Revolution.
Today, the remaining members of the Tuscarora nation live
in western New York and southeast Ontario.
In August 1999, Chief Kenneth Patterson and Princess
Jolene Gansworth and nearly two dozen other Tuscarora visited the plant in Mt. Pleasant to help celebrate the 100-year
anniversary of Tuscarora Yarns.
— From Tuscarora’s website
of fiber together, any percentages,” Hegarty said. “Nearly
everything we produce is custom
made. We don’t make anything
from stock. The requirement is
set up by the customer.”
One of the hottest products
among consumers and designers are vintage heather yarns
and Tuscarora has been at the
forefront of creating this unique
product range. These 100 percent cotton and also tri-blend
products create irregular patterned heathers.
The exceptional soft hand
has proven to be the most popular, Hegarty said.
The retro vintage look has
become a top seller for a number of name brands, thanks in
part to actresses such as Renée
Zelwegger and Lindsay Lohan
being spotted wearing them.
“This is a tremendously difficult product to produce on a
consistent basis to maintain its
irregularity,” Foil said. “Someone will always try and copy
a successful product, but ours
is the original and no one has
been able to duplicate its appearance and hand.”
The company also spins a
range of specialty fibers such as
bamboo, flax, specialty acrylics,
flame-resistant (FR) rayons,
FR acrylics, outdoor acrylics,
outdoor polyesters and antimicrobial polyester.
Its Bambu collection of products, made with bamboo, are
among those generating buzz
in the trade, Hegarty said. Several garments in the showroom
Continued on next page
5
Southern Textile News
Continued from previous page
were produced by blending predyed cotton fibers with bamboo
to create a heather effect. The
sample shirts have a nice drape
with a rayon feel and a sheen
like mercerized cotton.
As a renewable, natural resource, bamboo falls into the
sustainability category, which
of course is one of the biggest
trends in all industries these
days. But the “green” movement
is nothing new to Tuscarora,
which has produced a recycled,
cotton-based product, “Remade™” for more than 20
years for the upholstery market.
With Bambu and other fibers, the company has now
moved beyond recycling by
producing environmentally
friendly and health-conscious
products. Prominent among
the range are sustainable yarns
produced from USA organic
cotton fiber; Ingeo corn fiber
(licensed spinner); flax fiber;
and recycled post-consumer
waste polyester fiber, Ecospun
and Naturespun.
Other products in the
range are antimicrobial yarns
produced from Fosshield®
polyester; Invista Fresh FX™;
Nanohorizons SmartSilver®;
Cupron™ copper fiber; and
DAK Americas Delcron® HydroPur with AlphaSan®.
A number of other ecofriendly products are in the
works, including those from recycled polyester, Hegarty said.
“We recycle as much of our
waste as we possibly can and
that’s very important that we
continue to do that within the
company,” he said.
Five Star Process
Another differentiating factor for Tuscarora is its Five Star
process of making 100 percent
cotton colored heather yarns,
offering the most homogenous
blend possible, Foil said. This
unique process is protected and
made possible by patents held
by the company.
The process produces a
smooth fabric appearance with
an enhanced sheen and silky
look, providing a much better
hand, he added. And the lack of
neps in the fabric compares favorably to the best 100 percent
cotton heather yarns made anywhere in the world, he said.
The driving force behind
the development of the process
was Foil.
February 4, 2008
TEXTILE SOUTH EDITION
“The Five Star process came
about as a desire on my part
to make a world-class product,” Foil said. “And I thought
I knew how to do that, but I
couldn’t get anybody to work
with me to help me. I couldn’t
get a machinery company to let
me use their equipment and I
didn’t want to buy something to
bring in here and work with it
and hope that it would work.
“But I finally talked a used
machinery dealer into letting
me have a used piece of machinery and I set it up, got it
running and the first pound
I saw come off, I knew I got
it right. And that’s how Five
Star was born. It’s been very
successful. It’s not the end-all,
be-all because it’s not perfect.
Nothing’s perfect. But this year
we’re going to invest probably
another three quarters of a million dollars to put in some new
equipment to make Five Star
even better.”
When the process was introduced, it caused a “real stir”
in the business, Foil recalled,
because of the properties of the
product.
“We’ve sold a lot of product,
but some people don’t want to
pay for it,” he said. “Well that
doesn’t hurt our feelings. But
if they want that product and
want to differentiate themselves
— and that’s a key in the marketplace — then that’s a good
way to go.”
Tuscarora uses the Five Star
process on certain yarns that go
into Victoria’s Secret garments,
which may be one reason the
company is the only U.S. spinner that supplies yarns to the
well-known brand.
Modernization
Which brings us to manufacturing. Tuscarora produces
about 500,000 pounds of finished yarns each week at three
locations in the area:
• Mount Pleasant — open
end yarns are spun here primarily for home furnishings and
industrial applications;
• China Grove — also an
open-end spinning mill dedicated primarily to home
furnishings and apparel; and
• Oakboro — a ring-spun
operation the produces yarns
for home furnishings, apparel
(including hosiery) and industrial applications.
All three plants operate
non-stop, seven days a week.
Throughout its plants is machinery from such well-known
names as Rieter, Schlafhorst,
Zinser, Murata, Crosrol,
Suessen, Saco Lowell and Trützschler.
The crown jewel of the manufacturing triumvirate is the
Oakboro facility, an unassuming, U-shaped structure that
hardly looks like one of the
most modern yarn-spinning
plants in the world. But exterior
looks can be deceiving.
Inside, the plant has been
completely upgraded over
the last five years with much
more modern equipment that
achieves the highest production
speeds in the industry today,
said Andy Wheeley, vice president of Manufacturing.
In the spinning area, more
than 17,000 spindles are running, with yarn counts ranging
from 8s to 40s, he added.
For the carding area, Tuscarora recently placed a machinery
order for Rieter’s 365 combers.
The modernization project will
be complete when that installation goes in.
“We have a lot of proprietary
modifications to some of those
machines, from opening all the
way through to winding, some
of which were designed by our
own people,” Wheeley said.
A unique aspect of the plant
is the lack of automatic laydowns, Wheeley said.
“People are used to seeing
this big laydown of cotton and
a picker going up and down
doing that,” he said “But you
can’t do that at our facility. Everything has to be measured
and basically hand fed. So we
have all these hoppers where
we have to do this blending
and putting all these colors and
fibers together.
“This blending equipment
is totally computerized,” he
continued. “They’re all being
monitored, with safeguards to
make sure the drop weights are
exactly what they’re supposed to
be, because you have to make
sure that blend is exactly spot
Continued on next page
Andy Wheeley, vice president of Manufacturing, looks through
yarn samples in the color library.
Tuscarora puts its wide array
of yarns on display for
customers in finished products in its showroom.
Photos by Devin Steele
6
Southern Textile News
TEXTILE SOUTH EDITION
February 4, 2008
Continued from previous page
on. And you have to make sure
the color percentages are consistent. If someone orders a color
today, he wants the exact same
color six months from now or
a year from now or five years
from now.”
The company also is continuing to expand or upgrade
older equipment at its openend mills. Two older spinning
frames were recently replaced at
the Mount Pleasant plant, for
instance, and in China Grove,
equipment is being added to
increase capacity.
In ship shape
Exporting has been a crucial
part of Tuscarora’s strategies for
about 20 years and is more important now than ever before,
Hegarty said. To call the company a “free trader,” however, is
a bit misleading, he added.
“We’re not for all the free
trade agreements,” he said.
“We’re for fair trade agreements
and we don’t have a lot of fair
trade agreements. We have a
lot of free trade agreements.
There are not a lot of two-way
streets.”
To that end, Tuscarora is uti-
Rieter Corp. representatives and Tuscarora Yarns’ executives go over the installation of a Rieter Combing System planned for
Tuscarora’s Oakboro, NC, plant. (L-R) Hans Rothen, Rieter’s regional sales manager; Ueli Schmid, Rieter president and CEO;
Ervin Johnson, Tuscarora’s vice president of Finance; Martin Foil Jr., Tuscarora chairman and CEO; Peter Hegarty, Tuscarora
president; and Andy Wheeley, Tuscarora’s vice president of Manufacturing.
Photo by Devin Steele
Rieter system buy to complete Oakboro plant project
MOUNT PLEASANT, NC — Tuscarora Yarns, Inc. recently
placed a machinery order for a Rieter Combing System.
The order for Tuscarora’s Oakboro, NC, plant includes
Rieter’s E65 combers. The model E65 comber operates at rates
up to 450 nips per minute.
Rieter currently has more than 3,500 machines running
worldwide.
Tuscarora Yarns, a leading manufacturing of heather and mélizing the DR-CAFTA as well
as any U.S. company, industry
observers said. The region has
become the bread and butter of
its export business, as a number
of U.S. customers have relocated there.
“If it wasn’t for DR-CAFTA
— and to a lesser extent,
NAFTA in the beginning
— I’m not so sure that Tusca-
lange yarns, selected Rieter’s E65 Combing System to enhance
its focus on innovation and customer satisfaction, according to
Ueli Schmid, president of Rieter Corp., Spartanburg, SC, the
U.S. subsidiary of the Rieter Group, Winterthur, Switzerland.
The combing modernization of Rieter’s system will substantially raise Tuscarora’s quality standards and thus strengthen its
market position, according to Martin Foil Jr., Tuscarora Yarns
chairman.
rora would still be here today,”
Hegarty said.
Hegarty and his sales team
spend a good amount of time
in other countries, particularly
in Central America but also
Asia, he said.
Hegarty said he sees tremendous possibilities in Peru and
Colombia, two countries with
Continued on next page
DAK Americas is proud to be a quality suppler
of specialty polyester staple fibers to Southern
,
Textile News'' Textile South Featured Company,
Tuscarora Yarns.
David Benitez (top photo) checks a Trützschler DK 903 card,
while Ines Marisol Villegas (bottom) works on a Zinser 351
spinning machine in the Oakboro, NC, plant.
Photos by Devin Steele
7
Southern Textile News
TEXTILE SOUTH EDITION
February 4, 2008
Tuscarora one of first to explore export options
Continued from previous page
which the U.S. has free trade
agreements in the works — if
bilateral trade is allowed to occur.
“There is opportunity in
there,” he said. “When the Peru
agreement comes through, it
will give us a whole different
perspective because we’re going to be able to offer products
without duties and make us
more competitive with the local
spinners.
“We’ve had customers there
who want to work with us on
a lot of finer-quality products,
which is what we dedicate ourselves to — non-commodity,
higher-end, better products, or
more skilled labor work forces
versus volume,” he continued.
“That’s where I see a good potential for growth to diversify
our products.”
Supporting trade agreements
doesn’t mean Tuscarora is abandoning manufacturers north of
the border, he said.
“We have an incredible push
right now to develop more business in the United States, as
well as Canada,” he said. “We’re
finding there’s a lot more opportunities for new, start-up
companies here in America in
all three aspects of our business,
from apparel to home furnishings to industrial applications.
We’re aggressively going after
and developing new business
here in America. We’re coming up with new products that
we’ve never thought about making and it’s been good business
for us here in the U.S.”
The company does not favor
trade agreements with such
countries as Haiti, Korea, Singapore and Panama, according
to Hegarty, because they would
allow better opportunities for
transshipment and other forms
of fraud to occur.
Working with others in this
hemisphere gives Tuscarora
— and fellow U.S. companies
— advantages in several areas,
Hegarty pointed out. One is
replenishment.
“When a garment is flying
off the shelves, they can’t wait
six or 10 weeks to get it from
China,” he said. “They have to
make it quick and get it back
on the shelves and we can get it
to them in their time frame.”
Tuscarora’s color-matching
capabilities and short lead-time
requirements also play to its
advantage when doing business
Continued on next page
MOUNT PLEASANT, NC — Tuscarora Yarns was one of
the first U.S. textile companies to see a major change coming
as the industry began to recede — ever so slightly — in the late
1980s, according to Chairman Martin Foil Jr.
With a captive but shrinking U.S. customer base, the industry
knew it had to explore its exporting options. Trouble was, few of
them knew where to begin.
So Tuscarora, along with 38 other yarn production
companies, created a cooperative for that purpose
called the American Textile Export Company (AMTEC), based in Gaston County, NC.
Peter Hegarty was hired as president of AMTEC
from Unifi, Inc., where he headed the international
group.
In 1988, such a symbiotic organization may have
seemed improbable, given the competitive nature of
the domestic industry, Hegarty recalled recently.
“Can you imagine that?” Hegarty, now president
of Tuscarora, asked. “It was hard to even get them
together in the same room. For them to create this
cooperative for exporting was tremendous.”
The arrangement worked well for several years, Hegarty said,
until NAFTA was ratified and began to take effect. Companies
were becoming more savvy in international trade and AMTEC
would gradually begin to lose members.
By 2001, Tuscarora and four other predominant members of
AMTEC bought the organization, with Tuscarora being the majority owner. The organization was renamed AMTEC, LLC.
At the time, Hegarty was hired full-time by Tuscarora to lead
the company’s global marketing and sales effort, though he
would continue to lead AMTEC as well. Since then, Tuscarora
has continued to buy a bigger stake in AMTEC and
is now the majority stakeholder.
“The interesting thing is we have continued to
export for other spinners that are not owners of
AMTEC,” Hegarty said.
Recalling those early days of AMTEC and his
first encounters with Foil, Hegarty said he knew
from Day 1 the Tuscarora leader was forward thinking.
“I certainly thought AMTEC was the way to go,
as I’ve always been a trader, wandering around the
world,” he said. “Martin Foil had the vision as well.
He saw this market shrinking and Tuscarora got very
involved in the export business.”
“We still see continuing shifts from here to the CAFTA regions,” he added. “And as that shift continues we will continue to
increase our presence in CAFTA and do a better job working with
the key retailers in the places they make their garments.”
— Devin Steele
8
Southern Textile News
Continued from previous page
in the Southern Hemisphere,
he added.
Also, because Tuscarora is a
specialty producer, it can ship
smaller volumes to Latin, Central or South America and can
even combine loads with other
U.S. suppliers, Hegarty said.
He explains: “If a customer
has a commodity yarn they’re
buying from another spinner
and they need 5,000 or 10,000
pounds from us, we have an
advantage of consolidating container loads or we have enough
going down that we can consolidate with other customers
to export there. But if they have
to get it from Asia, they would
have to buy larger volumes. So
our minimums are a benefit.
We don’t need a container-load
quantity of yarn.”
Two important attributes for
the company are coordination
and communication throughout
the organization, Hegarty said.
Salesmen keep each other posted
on where each stands, and often
the work one is doing in one
country affects what a colleague
is doing in another country.
A tremendous amount of
communication between mills,
the color lab, sales, administration and management occurs
as well, which is important to
keeping everyone on the same
page, he added.
“We keep our communication flow going,” he said. “We
rely heavily on e-mail and our
sales team answers their phones
no matter what time of day or
night.”
Also, Tuscarora and its exporting arm, ATMEC, LLC,
both employ bilingual staffers
to handle customer calls.
Part of the company’s exporting success comes from
networking and marketing
February 4, 2008
TEXTILE SOUTH EDITION
opportunities gleaned from
membership in certain organizations, such as Cotton Council
International, a division of the
National Cotton Council; and
the American Apparel Producers Network.
“Peter and Tuscarora take advantage of CCI’s international
programs more than any other
company I know,” said Jesse
Curlee, president of the Supima
Association. “They’re very active with that association.”
Human capital
A team culture and a family
atmosphere pervades the company, according to Phil Absher,
director of Human Resources,
adding that communication
and employee involvement are
strongly encouraged.
“Employee opinions matter,”
he said. “And we also promote
healthy relationships between
management and employees.
Employees feel open to speak
with direct supervision and/or
senior management in a nonthreatening environment.”
Foil agreed with those sentiments.
“I’ve always believed that a
door has two handles and that’s
so you can open it and close it,”
he said. “I leave my door open
and everybody knows they can
come see me, whether it be the
janitor on the third shift or the
lady on the switchboard or the
salesman on the job. Doesn’t
make any difference. We try to
be fair.”
He added: “We try to see
that people have fun. They
spend more time with me than
they do with their family and
that’s a responsibility I don’t
take lightly. I tell people who
come to work here, they should
have three guiding principles in
their lives and that is, first and
foremost, that higher power
that they look to. Their family
should come next, and third, it
should be wherever they earn
their living. I believe if your priorities are organized like that,
you’re well on your way to lead
a happy and productive life.”
Employee motivation, rewards
and recognition and an emphasis
on health and safety have brought
Jarrett Lockhart of the product development area is measuring
color swatches created in the color-matching lab.
Photo by Devin Steele
about positive employee morale
and a high retention rate, Absher
said. The average length of service
is 15 years, and some employees
have worked as long as 38 years,
he added.
One reward that was much
appreciated among employees, Hegarty said, is employee
lunches. For three days twice a
year, around the Fourth of July
and Christmas, Absher prepares
meals on a grill for every shift at
all three plants.
“And it’s usually steaks and
chicken, not hot dogs and hamburgers — and a lot of baked
potatoes,” Hegarty said. “It really
emphasizes the family atmosphere
we have and the positive feedback
is tremendous.”
Absher added that Tuscarora
takes a proactive approach to its
benefits package and has implemented a wellness program
that includes health screenings.
Nurse coaches also are available
through the company’s health
administrator for discussion,
monitoring and follow-up.
The company has a strong
safety record at all facilities,
according to Absher. Safety
committees are active at each
plant, with Oakboro being recognized by the NC Dept. of
Labor a couple of years ago for
having logging 3 million hours
of work without a lost-time
accident, he said. The China
Grove facility, which also has
earned NCDOL recognition
recently, is approaching 1 million hours without a lost-time
accident, he added.
“Bottom line: Safety is good
business and it gives us an
advantage financially by controlling our costs,” he said.
“Morally, it’s the responsible
thing to do. And we do believe that that employee who is
earning that hourly wage is our
most valuable asset.”
Strategies for growth
Clearly, Tuscarora Yarns is
seeing its way through a murky
world. In a day when many
U.S. manufacturing companies,
textiles or otherwise, are finding
it harder and harder to turn a
profit, that says a lot.
Tuscarora’s formula for success is currently working well
for this small yarn spinner, but
isn’t universal. And the company knows it can never get
too comfortable, that it must
continue to actively pursue new
business opportunities, wherever they may lie, and stay on
the leading edge of technology
and innovation.
Distinction is critical.
So says Foil.
“We want to be on the cutting edge of what’s new and
different and be able to offer
those kinds of resources to
people who are going to differentiate themselves from the
masses,” he said. “We want to
Continued on next page
U.S. Congressman Robin Hayes (C) examines yarn packages
with Martin Foil Jr. (L), Tuscarora Yarns’ chairman and CEO,
and Darrell Morton, Oakboro plant manager, last month.
Hayes, who lives in nearby Concord, toured the company’s
Oakboro, NC, plant as part of the National Council of Textile
Organizations’ ‘Hill to the Mill’ campaign.
Photo by Devin Steele
Tuscarora Yarns leadership
Martin B. Foil Jr.
Chairman & CEO
n Served in those capacities since 1968
Peter J. Hegarty
President
n Length of Service: Four years
n Previous experience: President, American
Textile Export Company (AMTEC), Ranlo, NC,
1988-2002; Cruieselink, Inc., Greensboro,
NC, vice president, Sales and Marketing;
Krone, Ltd., Greensboro, NC, co-owner;
Unifi, Inc., Greensboro, NC, vice president,
International Sales; Ernest Scragg & Sons,
Ltd., Macclesfield, England, engineer.
Foil
Hegarty
Andrew Wheeley
Vice President of Manufacturing
n Length of Service: 28 years
n Previous experience: Cone Mills, Inc.
Wheeley
Ervin Johnson
Vice President of Finance
n Length of service: One year
n Previous experience: Express Personnel
Services, Acme Petroleum and Fuel Co.,
China Grove Textiles, Inc., Ernst & Whinney
Johnson
Joe McLester
Vice President of Sales
Administration
n Length of service: 24 years
n Previous experience: Dixie Yarns, Inc.
McLester
Phil Absher
Director of Human Resources
n Length of service: 10 years
n Previous experience: Key Risk
Management Services, Home Innovations,
Inc., Sara Lee Intimates, Collins & Aikman
Absher
Brad Perry
Sales Rep/Account Executive
n Length of service: 12 years
n Previous experience: Parkdale Mills, Inc.
C. Larry McDowell
Perry
Sales Rep/Account Executive
n Length of service: Nine years
n Previous experience: Avondale Mills (33
years)
Dee Dee Harris
McDowell
Director of Marketing
n Length of service: New hire
n Previous experience: Barnhardt
Manufacturing, American Fiber & Finishing
Harris
9
Southern Textile News
TEXTILE SOUTH EDITION
February 4, 2008
Suppliers call Tuscarora Yarns ‘ingenious,’ ‘innovative’
MOUNT PLEASANT, NC
— A diversified yarn spinner,
Tuscarora Yarns produces 100
percent cotton, synthetic and
blended yarns and relies heavily on its suppliers to provide
quality product, according to
Peter Hegarty, president of the
company.
One of those suppliers,
Tintoria Piana of Cartersville,
GA, established a presence in
the U.S. primarily because of
a relationship it forged with
Tuscarora, said Andrea Piana, executive vice president
of Tintoria Piana U.S., Inc., a
stock-dyeing mill for cotton.
“Tuscarora was the key that
stimulated us in our new adventure in this fantastic country,”
Piana said.
It started when Martin Foil
Jr., Tuscarora Yarns chairman
and CEO, was presented with
a yarn that was made and dyed
in Italy by Tintoria Piana. So
impressed was Foil with the
yarn’s attributes that he flew
to Italy to see how it was made
and, soon, he would be importing it “by the boat load,”
he said.
“It was the way they dyed
the fiber that differentiated it,”
Foil said. “I told the owner (of
Tintoria Piana) that if he comes
to the U.S., I would help him
get started here. I also told him
that if he comes here, he would
run everybody else doing that
out of business — and that’s
what happened.”
Tintoria Piana opened its
U.S. branch in 1995 and now
operates at a capacity of about
88,000 pounds of dyed and
blended cotton a day.
“Tuscarora is a very important customer for us,” Piana
said. “As in any long-term business relationship, it started as
business and has evolved into
friendship.
“Tuscarora is honest, professional, polite and reinventing
themselves constantly,” he said.
Tuscarora buys plenty of
dyed fiber from Tintoria Piana,
Foil said. “They are the best
fiber dyers in the world, bar
none,” he said.
Continued from previous page
make it and enable you to differentiate yourselves when you
show to the public something
that they won’t be able to turn
down.”
More praise
Meanwhile, Jeff Dellinger
of Foss Manufacturing, which
also supplies fiber to Tuscarora,
described the yarn spinner with
three adjectives any company
would be proud to have associated with its name.
“Capable, ingenious and
credible,” he said.
Foss sells Tuscarora its EcoSpun and FossShield® fibers to
Tuscarora. EcoSpun is a highquality polyester fiber made
from 100 percent certified
recycled plastic PET bottles.
FossShield® is a unique antimicrobial polyester that has
numerous applications.
“They’re been extremely
innovative with new ideas in
fibers,” Dellinger said. “They’ve
been able to grow in an industry where it’s difficult to grow
in, and that has to do with their
integrity, insights and innovation.”
A representative of another
partner, Wellman, Inc. called
Tuscarora a “pleasure to work
with.”
“They’re very strategic to
us,” said David Reed, whose
company works with Tuscarora to place specialty fibers
such as fine-denier polyester
ComFortrel® into the hosiery
market. “We have used them to
develop samples of new fibers
that we’ve introduced. They’ve
been timely, very cooperative
and very amenable to looking
at making new yarns out of our
new fibers.”
He added: “They’ve been extremely cooperative when we’ve
approached them on a need for
making yarns for development
fabrics or for making samples for
other customers. They jumped
all over it. They do what they
say they’re going to do, they do
it in a timely fashion and the
quality’s very good.”
Likewise, Henry Poston of
Palmetto Synthetics called the
relationship with Tuscarora
“excellent.” Palmetto, which
provides specialty synthetic
fibers, has worked with the
company on several projects.
Foil added that there are no
real secrets in the textile business — just different ways of
doing things.
“There are people who have
secret ways of putting chemicals
together or who make fabric
look and behave differently, but
given enough time, all those secrets are going to be unlocked.
What we’re doing this year,
we’ll be doing some of next
year. But hopefully we’ll keep
adding those layers of new and
exciting items that will continue to renew our outlook on
our business and customers as a
unique supplier.”
“For that part of our business they’re one of our best
customers,” Poston said. “Our
development people work with
their development people and
our purchasing people work
with their salesmen.
“They’re constantly looking
for new things and new innovations and they realize that that’s
what it takes to stay in business
today,” he added.
Another specialty fiber supplier, DAK Americas, sells
Tuscarora its Delcron® HydroTec moisture management
fiber and its HydroPur™ moisture management/antimicrobial
fiber.
“They’re a very innovative
company and have a niche in
the marketplace,” said DAK’s
Jim Netzel. “They’re always
interested in what’s new.”
Cotton cooperative Staplecotn called Tuscarora “very
straightforward” and “easy to
work with.”
“They have a strong niche
product and they seem to be
expanding,” he said. “At least
they’re buying more cotton now
than they have in the past.”
Meanwhile, Jesse Curlee,
president of Phoenix-based Supima Association, gave high
praise to his main Tuscarora
contact, Hegarty.
“He’s always been international focused, even when
the industry wasn’t so much,”
Curlee said. “He’s a very export-oriented textile guy. He’s
very knowledgeable about their
heather yarns business. He’s
very good on the downstream
marketing and he works with
brand and retailers.”
Tuscarora is the only Supima-licensed spinner of heather
yarns in this hemisphere.
Curlee, who said he has seen
Hegarty a number of times in
foreign countries, said the Tuscarora president is constantly
meeting with his customers and
aggressively staying abreast of
his competitors. “He uncovers
every stone,” Curlee said.
“We view our relationships
with our vendors as parternships and they are an integral
part of our business,” Hegarty
said.
— Devin Steele
WINTER CONFERENCE 2008
Feb. 12-13, 2008
Sheraton Airport Plaza, Charlotte, NC
Everyone has heard the words “green,” “environmentally friendly,” “conservation,”
“carbon footprint reduction” and “sustainability.” As the business marketplace
embraces the “earth- friendly initiative,” it is necessary for the supply chain, including
service providers and manufacturers, to understand this new direction as well as ways
to participate in the market and achieve success.
Seeing the need for sustainability in a world where finite energy sources are quickly
being depleted, the Synthetic Yarn and Fiber Association (SYFA) and the Fiber
Surface Group (FSG) dedicate our 2008 Winter Conference to this prevalent topic.
Conference agenda
Tuesday, February 12
n 12-1 p.m. — Registration
n 1-1:15 p.m. — Welcome & Overview of Conference — John Edwards, Nan Ya Plastics, and Bob
Barker, FSG
n 1:15-2:45 p.m. — Keynote Address: Pioneering Sustainability — Ray Anderson, Interface, Inc.
n 2:45- 3:15 p.m. — Sustainability & Synthetic Fiber: A Global Review — Alasdair Carmichael, PCI
Fibres
n 3:15-3:30 — Break
n 3:30-4 p.m. — Fiber Finish Design from Rapidly Renewable Resources — Srinivasan Ranganathan,
Goulston Technologies, Inc.
n 4- 4:30 p.m. — Green Chemistry Applications for Textiles — John Warner, Warner Babcock Institute
of Green Chemistry
n 4:30-5 p.m. — Spin Finish Oil from the Sun — Dr. Holger Bender, Pulcra Chemicals
n 5-5:30 p.m. — Turning on an Industry: Renewable Energy Sources — Stephen Kalland, NC State
Solar Center
n 5:30-7:30 p.m. — Cocktail Reception & Networking
Wednesday, February 13
n 8-8:15 a.m. — Welcome and Overview — John Edwards, Nan Ya Plastics
n 8:15-8:45 a.m. — Driving Sustainability in the Automotive Industry — John Viera, Ford Motor Co.
n 8:45-9:15 a.m. — Clothing Matters — A Venture in Economic, Ecological Elective: Eco-Friendly
Fashion and Promotional Apparel — Marta Swain, Clothing Matters
n 9:15-9:45 a.m. — The Many Colors of Green — Mark LaCroix, InterfaceFABRIC, Inc.
n 9:45-10 a.m. — Break
n 10-10:30 a.m. — Fabric for Life: Patagonia’s Sustainable Initiatives — Randy Harward, Patagonia
n 10:30-11 a.m. — Sitting Pretty: Steelcase’s Sustainable Initiatives — Denise VanValkenburg, Steelcase
n 11-11:30 a.m. — Doing Well by Doing Good — Lee Woodard, Next Right Decision
n 11:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. — Panel Discussion: Overview of Sustainable Textile Standards — Carol
Derby, Designtex; Bob Peoples, CRI; & Mark LaCroix, InterfaceFABRIC, Inc.
n 12:30-1:30 p.m. — Lunch Discussion — Doug MacNair, Entrix, Inc.
n 1:30-1:45 p.m. — Closing Remarks — John Edwards, Nan Ya Plastics, and Bob Barker, FSG
To register, call Kim Pettit at (704) 824-3522, send e-mail to [email protected] or
visit www.syfa.org.
10 Southern Textile News
TEXTILE SOUTH EDITION
February 4, 2008
CHAT WITH THE CHAIRMAN
Foil offers 60-year perspective on company, industry
Editor’s note: Martin Foil Jr., chairman of Tuscarora Yarns, Inc., Mount Pleasant,
NC, recently sat down for an interview with Devin Steele, STN editor. He has led
Tuscarora since his father’s passing in 1968 and has been involved with the company in
some form or fashion since he was a pre-teen. One of the last of the still-working breed of
Southern textile magnates, he covered a number of topics from his 60-year perspective in
the industry. Throughout his career, Foil, 74, has spoken with numerous U.S. presidents
and lawmakers about industry issues and has testified on Capitol Hill on numerous occasions. Following are excerpts of the interview.
STN: What factors, externally and internally, have contributed to your
company’s success and how has your philosophy and ability to adapt played
a role?
Foil: Are you asking me why we’re still in business? I think the biggest problem
in the last 20 years has been the inability of CEOs to pull the trigger. The industry
has always gone through cycles. When you talk
to them, it was always, “well it’s not good right
now, but it’ll be back in the fall or it’ll be back
in the spring or it’ll be back in the summer.”
Well, it came that time where it never came
back. NAFTA had a lot to do with that. But be
that as it may, a lot of these people didn’t invest
in newer technologies and they always thought
that tomorrow things were going to be better.
So they never made provisions for what was
necessary to survive.
You know if you’re sitting down there making
a zillion yards of whatever and 100,000 yards of this or that and always thought
there was going to be a market for it and you didn’t try to differentiate your products but made the same old stuff year end and year out, sooner or later these people
with lower labor costs and cheaper products were going to get you. They just didn’t
pay attention so they didn’t close those plants that were too expensive to upgrade
and they didn’t look to see what else they could do in the marketplace to differentiate themselves.
STN: When Tuscarora helped create the American Textile Export Company
(AMTEC) in the late 1980s, what kind of writing on the wall were you seeing
for the industry?
Foil: One was the ability to make a profit. That was the biggest hurdle everybody
had to overcome. So when you look at your balance sheet and you look at your income statement, you have to make a decision. Am I making the right products? Am
I getting a fair return on my investment? Where can I squeeze out costs? And there
are three things you look at for cost. One is your raw material base. Two is your cost
of manufacturing — that is your labor and electrical, for instance, fixed and variable
costs that go into making a product. And the third and most importantly is your
SG&A. And I think that’s where some of the old-line companies failed. They were
late in addressing their SG&A.
Martin Foil Jr. (L) shows close friend and U.S. House Representative Robin
Hayes (R-NC) yarn sliver during the lawmaker’s tour of the company’s Oakboro,
NC, plant recently. Hayes’ visit is part of the National Council of Textile Organization’s ‘Hill to the Mill’ campaign, which brings elected officials into U.S.
textile plants. Foil has known Hayes since their childhoods.
Photo by Devin Steele
they want that product and want to differentiate themselves — and that’s a key in
the marketplace — then that’s a good way to go.
We have some people out there, for instance, who think that selling to Wal-Mart
is the greatest thing since sliced bread. We sell Wal-Mart but Wal-Mart is not the
end all, where you should chase it. You’ve got Wal-Mart selling $5 or $6 shirts.
At the other end of the scale, we’ve got people selling shirts that go to people like
Lindsay Lohan for 70 bucks. Well I’d rather sell the fiber that went into the 70-buck
shirt. You’d be surprised how many teenagers want a Lindsay Lohan shirt that costs
70 bucks as opposed to a $5 shirt from Wal-Mart.
So there’s a big, exciting market out there that differentiates itself from everything
else. And that demands quick turn, it demands attention to detail.
It’s like being a surfer. You’ve got to ride the waves while they’re out there. Yeah,
we’ve hit a lot of troughs, too, no question about it.
STN: You mentioned quick turn and attention to detail, something others
such as the Chinese aren’t capable or willing to do. Please address the
importance of maintaining a U.S. manufacturing base.
Foil: That’s right here (tapping his heart). I have a meeting on the with the head
of the North Carolina Chamber of Commerce and I’m going to blister him real
good about manufacturing. I think our government, led by this president, has done
a horrible job of protecting the American worker
STN: So you saw a change coming and adapted
and the American people.
“We have to be able to feed our people,
accordingly?
I do not think we’re capable in this country
we have to be able to clothe our people,
Foil: It was either change or fold up. There was no
anymore of making the garments for our solwe have to be able to deliver the energy
real alternative.
diers, our sailors, our airmen, our Coast Guard.
to keep it running and we should be able
Our textiles have been decimated to the point
STN: What were your initial feelings about
to
manufacture
what’s
necessary
in
this
where I don’t think we could deliver the necesNAFTA when was proposed?
sary products for another world war. I wrote the
country to be self-sufficient. And we are
Foil: We were in favor of NAFTA. We thought it
president about that. Of course, I didn’t get an
not. And if we’re not careful it will be the
was a good thing. Some people would say a necessary
answer. I’m a strong believer in that.
end of America and the end of a golden
evil. I think, looking back now, I certainly would be
A lot of people think of textiles as a Southern
more in favor of CAFTA than NAFTA. I don’t believe
era.”
phenomenon that’s geared toward extremely
in free trade — I believe in fair trade. And our govcheap wages with people who have no or little
ernment doesn’t know the difference.
education. Nothing could be further from the truth today. And we struggle to do
the right thing.
STN: How important is innovation to your company’s success?
A lot of people point their fingers and say, you talk a good game but you buy all
Foil: I think that’s the driving force.
your equipment from overseas. That’s correct. And the reason is, our government
STN: What about R&D?
didn’t do anything to encourage these people to stay in business over here to make
Foil: I am the R&D. When you think of R&D, most people think, “let’s go out equipment to manufacture, to take care of the textile industry. So all of that busiand create something.” Being creative is not a matter of sitting down and saying, ness did go overseas.
And if we’re going to compete with the world today and be able to help our gov“OK, I’m going to be creative today. I’m going to come up with three ideas. Y’all
watch out, here I come.” Doesn’t happen that way. You can go months or maybe ernment in a war or keep our people clothed, we have no option but to do that.
There are some pockets of people here in the United States who are still thriving,
even years without having a genuine creative idea that will put money below the
even
under these circumstances. And these are the people I’m proudest of and try
bottom line.
to pattern our business after. But they’re few and far between. And I’m afraid some
STN: Tuscarora’s Five-Star Process is your brainchild. How was that initially day that will come back to bite this country in the fanny when we’re going to need
received?
an industry to step up and do what’s necessary.
We have to be able to feed our people, we have to be able to clothe our people,
Foil: That caused a real stir. It makes your product real homogenous. It gives it a
very silky hand and it almost looks like a mercerized product. So when you put all we have to be able to deliver the energy to keep it running and we should be able to
that together, a lot of people think that makes a very fine product and we’ve sold manufacture what’s necessary in this country to be self-sufficient. And we are not.
And if we’re not careful it will be the end of America and the end of a golden era.
a lot of product.
Some people don’t want to pay for it. Well, that doesn’t hurt our feelings. But if
Continued on next page
11 Southern Textile News
TEXTILE SOUTH EDITION
Continued from previous page
STN: You served in the U.S. Army
Quartermaster Corps. Were you enlisted
during war time?
Foil: I missed Korea by about six months. In
1959 I won a national award for people in textile
schools on addressing the issue of overseas competition. And I haven’t changed my position since
1959. The dean at NC State asked me to enter the
competition.
STN: So, you’ve been personally involved and emotionally invested in that
issue for a long time ...
Foil: I don’t do the things in NCTO and things like that, like Peter (Hegarty,
Tuscarora president) does. I’m more of a voice crying in the wilderness. But I think
it’s sad that the government doesn’t understand that our industry is strategic to the
survival of our country.
I mentioned in my letter to the president that we either would fight the next war
naked or we’d have to get our uniforms from the Chinese. Heck, I almost believe
that. I mean, it’s really sad.
When the people in the Congress have to tell the Pentagon to source their uniforms in the United States and not buy from China and Pakistan and India and
places like that, what are they thinking? What’s going to happen in the next world
war if our competition is China and India and Pakistan or anybody else? I’m aghast
that they don’t understand.
With all the industry that’s closed down, I don’t know that it can be done. The
government would have to invest some money in the industry to get it back where
it could compete. But even if it did that, where are they going to get the equipment
if the world isn’t going to ship it in here to us?
STN: How’s your relationship with Congressman Robin Hayes (R-NC)?
Foil: We’re good friends. We grew up together in Concord. I knew his granddaddy, Mr. Charles Cannon, real well. He’s a big booster for the Pentagon and
particularly for our (military) folks down in Fort Bragg. He believes as I do that
we’re not prepared and we will not be prepared unless we do something.
February 4, 2008
A closer look at ...
Martin B. Foil Jr., Tuscarora chairman & CEO
n Wife: Carolyn
n Children: Quincy, a graduate of Meredith College, with three
children and founder, Cabarrus Arts Experience; Marty, a
graduate of Davidson College and project manager, Hinds
Feet Farm, a non-profit organization dedicated to serving
persons living with brain injury; Mary, Tampa, FL; and Philip,
who received a traumatic brain injury 17 years ago
n Education: Graduate, Fishburne Military School, Waynesboro,
VA, 1951; B.S., business administration, Davidson College,
1955; B.S. degree (with honors), textile engineering, NC State
University, 1959
n Military: U.S. Army Quartermaster Corp., Fort Benning, GA,
1955-57
n Honors: Selected as Phi Psi “Man of the Year 1988” for the
U.S. textile industry; recipient, 1983 “Nine Who Care Award”
in the business/industry category for the Piedmont area of
North Carolina; recipient, 1999 Philip L. Lance Award for
Public Awareness of Brain Injury; recipient, 1999 Governor’s
Business Award given by the Governor’s Business Council on
the Arts and Humanities; recipient, John W. Kuykendan Award
for community service by Davidson College, 2000
n Civic: Board of Directors, Alexis de Tocqueville Society, United
Way of Central Carolinas, Inc.; Active member, First
Presbyterian Church, Concord, NC; board member, Cabarrus
County Boys’ and Girls’ Club; past president, board member,
Old Courthouse Theatre, Concord, NC; past chairman, board
member, Cabarrus Cooperative Christian Ministry; general
chairman, United Way of Cabarrus County, 1984; past
president, United Way; past board member, United Way
of Central Carolinas, Inc.; past board member, Presbyterian
Healthcare; past president, board member, Hospice of Cabarrus
County; member, Board of Visitors, Davidson College,
University of North Carolina at Charlotte and Stowe Botanical
Gardens; board member, Cabarrus Arts Experience; Board
of Directors, Presbyterian Hospital Foundation; past chairman,
Brain Injury Association, Inc.; past treasurer, National Head
Injury Foundation; past chairman, member of Board of
Governors, International Brain Injury Association; Board of
Directors member, John Jane Brain Injury Center, University
of Virginia; Board of Directors member, National Brain Injury
Research, Treatment & Training Foundation; Board of Directors
member, Hinds’ Feet Farm; member, Traumatic Brain Injury
Advisory Council of North Carolina, 2004, appointed by Jim
Long, NC Commissioner of Insurance
STN: Do you think this free-trade, globalization tide is going to be prevalent
in this election cycle?
Foil: I don’t know. I think this president has done this country a great disservice.
I tell a lot of people this story. When I was 13 years old I used to ride the train to
Philadelphia a lot. I went to the doctor up there. I would sleep in the top bunk and
my daddy would sleep in the bottom bunk. And about 7 o’clock every morning,
a guy would come in and wake everybody up and give us time to get ready before
we pull into Penn Station.
And I would look out my window and we’d be rolling through a town called
Chester, Pennsylvania. And there was a building which was probably a warehouse
near the tracks. It was an old red, weathered building. And it had a white sign on
it that was also faded. It was outlined in white and in white it said, “What Chester
Makes Makes Chester.” That has always stayed in my mind.
What it says is that if we’re going to continue to be a great nation, we’ve got
to make things and we’ve got to sell things. We’ve got to be self-sufficient. Well,
we’re fast becoming a service nation and that is very, very poor. We’ve got some of
the brightest people in the world who work in America and their gifts are being
outsourced to people who are taking advantage of us. And our so-called free trade
policies have caused us unbelievable problems. And it’s not that free trade is bad.
It’s just that our government is myopic and can’t discern the difference between free history of giving back to the community. Please address the importance of
that.
trade and fair trade.
Foil: I think companies have an obligation to the citizens of the area from which
Now if you look at our automobile industry, their problem is not that they’re
they
operate, not just the ones who work there. And given that they have the renot smart anymore and not that they’re not automated. Their problem is, you
know how much an auto worker makes an hour? About $80. Well no wonder we’re sources to make a difference, they should endeavor to make a difference. I’m a big
believer in that.
not competitive. I don’t begrudge $80 an hour
if they can make a profit, but they can’t make a
STN: Going forward, what is your strategy for
“We’ve got some of the brightest people
profit.
growth and prosperity?
in the world who work in America and
Do we still need an automobile industry? AbFoil: I think there’s a finite amount of what we
solutely. How are we going to make tanks, how
their gifts are being outsourced to people
can do because we are not a commodity house of
we going to make Humvees, how are we going to
who are taking advantage of us. And our
any description. I think there will be pockets of
make the armored personnel carrier? I mean, if we
opportunity like the whole green scenario. We’re
so-called free trade policies have caused
don’t have that ability, we can’t make planes that
taking advantage of the green scenario. But we’ve
us unbelievable problems. And it’s not
are competitive. I give up. They need help.
been doing the green scenario since 1960. ...
that free trade is bad. It’s just that our
But when you go overseas and you look at our
That reminds me of a story about “The Shadow,”
competition, it subsidizes its industries. And they
government is myopic and can’t discern
(begins speaking in bass voice) “Who knows what
don’t have the government making demands on
the difference between free trade and fair
opportunities lie out there for textiles?”
every single thing.
trade.”
When you think about it, our biggest competiSome of the rules have really been good. Like
tion probably is going to be India in the next 20
for instance, I used to fuss about clean air. I’m
years. They’re going to be cheaper than Pakistan and
now one of the biggest proponents of clean air. You could eat off the floors at our
they’re smarter, in my opinion. And they’re loading up on the newest technology.
plants. That environment is good for the people. It should be a nice place to work,
But what you’ve got is when something is being driven by mistake, what are they
it should be clean, it should be safe.
going to do? They’re going to be going after amazing amounts of volume of the
The government does do some things that are beneficial. But some of the things
things they can do like plain-Jane sheets, towels, washcloths, whatever. They will
they do are really dumb, like rainwater preparedness, storm water runoff. How am I
pound it out and sell it to where some of these retailers can’t say no. We want to
supposed to prevent six inches of rain ... why is that my responsibility? God’s going
stay out of the way of that. We want to be on the cutting edge of what’s new and
to do what God does. I wish he’d send some our way.
different and be able to offer those kinds of resources to people who are going to be
STN: Your company, starting when your father was in charge, has a long able to differentiate themselves from the masses.