WSET.com - ABC13Galax Company Expansion Means Great News for Area & Country

Reporter: David Tate

Galax, VA - Vaughan-Bassett announced a major expansion Thursday.  Compared to a national average of less than 3%, sales at one of the world's largest furniture companies have been up 20% over each of the past two quarters, and management is crediting three specific things.

Company officials say the big thing keeping them in the game during this recession has been their workforce.  Second, they credit being an all "Made in America" company.   Third, they give a big tip of the hat to Diane Sawyer and ABC News.

Last summer, a national TV crew with Sawyer highlighted Vaughan-Bassett's bedroom line in its very popular series, "Made in America." Ever since, poor and economy don't belong in the same sentence here.

"I don't know whether the program turned on the light bulb or the program recognized what was going on. But in any case we absolutely saw a change in demand after that program aired," said Wyatt Bassett, CEO Vaughan-Bassett Furniture Company.

While the great recession has taken a toll on this company, that makes up the heart of Galax, the news that 115 workers will join the current crew of more than 600 is a big step forward.

"Like the rest of the country, we went through a very dark period of time of really very dark economic times and a lot of companies closed, a tremendous amount of people lost their jobs and that seems to be turning in the other direction now," said C.M. Mitchell, mayor of Galax.

In all, $8 million will go into modernizing an old furniture factory next to Vaughan-Bassett's main factory, which itself will be expanding to make room for the increased production.

Jay Guynn with Guynn Furniture, a major customer of Vaughan-Bassett, says the expansion shows the area is turning the economic corner.  However, more importantly, he says the country is again seeing value in the "Made in America" label.

"More and more Americans are starting to feel the need to buy American, which hasn't been the case over the last 20 years," said Guynn.

"For a long time, we heard people want to buy more "Made in the US." For the first time in the last six months or so, we're seeing a substantial increase in the demand for people actually making purchases for furniture made right here," said Bassett.

Work refurbishing the former Webb Furniture building is underway, and the plan is to have it online by March.  The complete expansion is scheduled to be complete by July, at which time production capacity is expected to be increased 50%.