Editor’s note: The symmetry of 52 weeks in a year and 26 letters in our alphabet inspired us here at The Eatonton Messenger to embark on an alphabetical journey of Putnam County every other week this year, looking at something – or someone – unique, significant, unusual, or just plain interesting.
Logs go in, and lumber and wood chips come out, all carried by a seemingly endless parade of big rigs making daily drop-offs and pickups. It’s a familiar sight for anyone who travels regularly past the sprawling wood-processing plant alongside Dennis Station Road, in southern Putnam County.
Opened in the 1970s, the original mill was a relatively small operation that produced lumber for local building projects, not unlike hundreds of others dotting the American Southeast at the time.
As it gradually expanded, the Eatonton mill was bought and sold a couple of times before capturing the attention of Western Canada-based International Forest Products (Interfor), among the world’s largest forest products companies with a global annual lumber capacity of more than five-billion board feet. Interfor closed on its purchase of the Eatonton location on March 1, 2013, along with two other sawmills in Baxley and Swainsboro for a combined $80 million.
In an obvious show of long-term commitment, the company then established a new corporate office for the U.S. Southeast region in May the following year, at relatively nearby Peachtree City.
At the time of purchase, the three new Interfor sawmills in Georgia had a combined annual capacity of about 360 million board feet. These days, the Eatonton operation alone can exceed that number.
According to an email message from Interfor Production Superintendent and interim mill manager Mike Stockdale, “The employees at the Eatonton facility produce enough lumber for building approximately 125 2,000-square-foot homes each week.”
He also called the local workforce “talented, well-trained and diverse.” Stockdale said in two shifts operating five days a week, approximately 107 hourly employees plus 23 salaried people work at the Dennis Station outlet, including some who have been with the facility since it was built. Total global employment for Interfor reportedly exceeds 3,400.
Stockdale said Interfor offers many career opportunities, too, not only in Eatonton but in other areas of the South and Northwest U.S., and even internationally. He said the company is prepared to offer long-term employment with training, education, and competitive pay and benefits in its efforts to attract and retain the best talent.
“We want to develop a workforce that reflects the diversity and strengths of our communities with our veteran workforce, women and men in minority groups, Canadian Indigenous group, a skilled workforce, and more,” Stockdale wrote in his email. “We like to promote from within when we are looking at advancements for our crew members.”
Interfor also operates a maintenance apprenticeship program, a three-year process through which it trains current employees while on the job to become U.S. Department of Labor certified journey millwrights at no cost to the employee.
“Once the program is complete, they have the option to continue their education to obtain their associate degree,” Stockdale added. “Other training programs include our Leadership Training, BCIT (British Columbia Institute of Technology) Industrial Wood Processing program, and Business of Sawmilling program that is offered to both salaried and hourly employees.”
Since 2019, Interfor officials say an additional $90 million has been invested in expanding and modernizing the Putnam County location alone, which now leads the company’s U.S. operations in production with its lumber shipped by truck and rail, primarily in-state or to distributors and job sites in neighboring Alabama, Florida, and the Carolinas. Foreign shipping is steadily increasing, too, company officials confirmed, as easy proximity from Putnam County to the Savannah port has seen Interfor’s local export business more than double over the past three years.
In a letter sent to Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp early last month, Interfor President and CEO Ian Fillinger said Interfor is now the largest lumber producer in the state, third largest throughout the Southeast, and the Putnam County location represents the company’s most expensive mill modernization project since its founding in the 1930s and in 1967 becoming a publicly traded company (TSX: IFP).
The abundant availability of thousands of acres of nearby, mature southern yellow pine trees is quite literally fueling Interfor’s local growth. Responsible forest management remains one of the company’s stated objectives, though, and Interfor adheres to independent, non-profit Sustainable Forestry Initiative standards and rules, designed to mitigate climate impacts, increase resilience to fire threats, practice responsible forest management, and recognize and respect the rights and traditional knowledge of Indigenous Peoples while harvesting trees. SFI certification also requires third-party audits and reviews of all stipulations.
Stockdale’s email stressed that Interfor also supports the communities where its operations and employees are located by providing local schools with wood chip donations for playgrounds, lumber for building classrooms and amenities like horse stables, and supporting special-needs programs and other local charities.
“In 2022, Interfor announced a formal partnership with Habitat for Humanity International. Each Interfor mill and office was partnered with Habitat for Humanity affiliates located in our communities,” Stockdale pointed out. “The Eatonton location partnered with Habitat for Humanity, Putnam County Division, to build two homes on South Madison Avenue and we look forward to this summer for a third build.”