Sewing Plant Shuts Down
By Miles Shuper

Visalia - Less than six months after starting operations in Visalia, Stone Blue Inc., a Los Angeles-based garment company, changed locks on its doors and security gates without notice leaving more than 100 workers jobless three weeks before Christmas.

Most of the workers, many who had worked at the Santa Fe Avenue plant through several owners, were greeted Monday by locked gates. The locks were changed sometime Saturday after the two dozen employees who worked earlier that day had left, according to one worker who confirmed no advance notice of a shutdown had been given.

Two days later, on Wednesday, workers lined up alongside the former Sierra Pacific Apparel building to receive checks they had learned would be delivered that day. A metal gate into the parking lot of the 100,000 square foot manufacturing plant was opened only enough to let checks be handed out. A private security guard stood in front of the opening. On Monday and again on Wednesday some small pieces of equipment were being loaded into pickup trucks.

Chuck Thomas, operations manager for Stone Blue, and a longtime worker at the plant, said the closure came with no warning and referred any questions to Stone Blue ownership in South California. Thomas would say only he did not want to jeopardize the welfare of any former workers of the Visalia plant.

Three workers told The Voice in previous weeks worker paychecks had bounced but subsequently were made good. Other workers, who asked not to be identified, said working conditions under Stone Blue were poor and that the owners and management yelled at and belittled workers. “They called us stupid and lazy and made one lady cry,” said one long-time employee.  That was a drastic change from previous conditions under Chic by H.I.S. which ran its operations in the plant prior to closing down and moving all its production to its headquarters in Durango, Mexico.
Most of the workers hired by Stone Blue had worked for Sierra Pacific Apparel and then Chic. Some even worked for Bayly Manufacturing prior to Sierra Pacific Apparel.

Calls to the Stone Blue Inc. headquarters were not returned.  But there were indications that the company is pulling out of its Visalia operation which officially began in September although some workers were on site at least a month earlier. At that time Chuck Thomas, plant manager announced that 400 employment applications had been sent out and 400 had been returned.  Over the next several weeks the work force swelled to more than 150 with indications it would increase once sewing orders were received.  The weekly payroll in recent months, was estimated at about $25,000 to $30,000 per week, according to workers.

Local realtor Marty Zeeb who visited the plant this week on behalf of the owner, was told by a company official that the closure “was just temporary”.  Others doubt it will reopen.

One of those waiting for his check Wednesday morning was Robert Navarro, who had worked at the plant for five years.  He was a supervisor in the receiving department.

As his pregnant wife and young child waited in the family truck, Navarro, a Farmersville resident, said there had been layoffs in recent weeks but no indications the shutdown would come so suddenly. He was one of a twenty or so who worked Saturday prior to the change of the locks, he said. “I plan to look for another job right away.”
Sources close to the sewing operations at the plant said the equipment in the plant, including sewing machines and huge industrial washing machines was worth a total of up to $1.5 million.

Records indicate Stone Blue Inc. paid slightly over $600,000 to buy the business from Chic. Although Stone Blue brought in some of its Southern California equipment, most of the sewing machines and the big washers were on a lease basis and not owned by Stone Blue.  An industry source said the washers, which weigh up to 22,000 pounds each are less than five years old and cost about $100,000 each.

Lou Kennedy, a Los Angeles business man who has owned the building for many years, said Stone Blue owners, an immigrant Korean family, indicated they were pulling out of Visalia operation even though their lease was far from over.   Kennedy met with Stone Blue officials Wednesday afternoon, but said no formal business dealings had been concluded.  He would not comment on the possibility that Stone Blue might consider purchasing the equipment at the Visalia plant and moving it.

Kennedy, who told the Voice he purchased the plant years ago “to keep jobs in Visalia”, said he hopes another company will come in to fill the void. Kennedy, who owns other buildings in Southern California, said he likes Visalia and has enjoyed a long-term working relationship with Ernie Acquafresca, a co-owner of Sierra Pacific Apparel and former plant manager for Bayly. It was Acquafresca, Kennedy said, who convinced him to buy the old Bayly plant to help insure area residents had jobs. Kennedy pledged his efforts to try and find another tenant for the plant, one which could keeps jobs in the area.

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Visalia - Visalia will be among six cities in the Valley who will get enhanced smog check rules beginning in 12 months.

That’s the word from Tom Jordan, a senior planner with the Air District.  The cities are: Visalia, Merced, Manteca, Lodi, Tracy and Turlock, according to the Bureau of Automotive Repair (BAR), the state agency who enforces the smog check rules.  The Valley was recently downgraded to “Severe Non-attainment” status with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and so-called smog check 2 procedures “helps clean up our fleet of cars - a major source of air pollution,” says Jordan.

The 12-month lead time is needed for BAR to inform the stations so they can buy the necessary equipment to carry out the tougher smog checks, he says.

Jordan says BAR already requires the tougher rule in metro areas like Fresno.  “Our board may request they add other Tulare County zip codes to the three Visalia zip codes in the next few months.  If they do, BAR will add these areas like the City of Tulare to the new rule.  With Smog Check, two cars are put on a kind of treadmill for cars - a dynamometer that measures more closely “real world driving conditions,” says Jordan.

As a matter of practicality the new rules will likely go into place January 2002, he suggests.

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Visalia - The Visalia HomeBase store will close sometime in the next 12 months, probably much sooner, as the parent company announced December 5th that it will exit the crowded home improvement sector.

Visalia is one of 84 stores that will close, some in the L.A. area are already closed, with 62 of the stores scheduled to re-open in a new format as House 2 Home decorating stores.

Irvine-based Home Base, whose stores are all in the West, has faced stiff competition from Home Depot and Lowes stores in the do-it-yourself home improvement category selling everything from lumber to windows to plumbing fixtures and garden products. Their huge 100,000 sq. ft. outlet is a landmark on Mooney.  The store is next to Costco on south Mooney.

In Visalia the company leases their space.  In Visalia the company also competes with local lumber stores, Orchard Hardware Supply and nearby Lumberjack - whose parent company has had problems of their own.

Company spokesperson Jennifer Love said that there has not been a decision whether to close the Visalia store permanently or re-open it in the new decorating store format.

Home Base has been hard hit by the tough competition with same store sales down 9% from last year and a net loss for the year of around $70 million.

The new format could mean a turnaround, says company president Herbert Zarkin.  “We think we have the financial wherewithall to do this,” noting that “even if the economy slows, people still want to decorate their homes.”

Home Base was once a high flyer on Wall Street with a stock price of around $11 a share in January 1998 (their high) compared to 1 and 3/8 this week.

Home Base already converted a handful of stores to the new House 2 Home format and the concept may fly, says a source familiar with the format.  “My guess is that they will convert the Visalia store,” says one informed source, rather than close it.

The company is taking a big risk however, but the pace of digging the company further in the hole could not continue, says industry sources.

Mayor Don Landers says he was aware that Home Base is Visalia has been facing a challenge and even heard discussion that the closing of Home Base could allow next door Costco, who seeks a larger size store to expand at their existing site.  That’s an idea that many council members favor and there may be some negotiating between the property owner and Home Base now that this has happened in the past few days.

Already in a number of L.A. outlets the company has sold their inventory to a liquidator who will sell out the inventory as fast as possible. That is expected to happen in Visalia in due time, says Jennifer Love.  Yes folks, that means a big sale, all you bargain hunters.

The home decorating store caters more to women and relies less on items that are the same found in any store, allowing House 2 Home to sell at higher margins.

In Visalia, Lowes has reportedly signed a deal to locate a new store just south of the Home Base across Packwood Creek on south Mooney.  Developer Don Orosco, who is filing an Environmental Impact Report with the city this week has told the Voice that Lowes has approved the location for new home improvement stores.  Orosco’s shopping center plans will be discussed by the planning commission and city council within a few months.

Besides Visalia, Home Base has two stores in Fresno and Bakersfield and could easily shut either one in each market, sources say.

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Tulare County - The Board of Directors of the Tulare County Economic Development Corporation selected Paul Saldana, as its new President and Chief Executive Officer.  Saldana, a nationally Certified Economic Development professional, has been involved in economic development for the past 15 years.  He is currently the Director of Community & Economic Development for the City of Atascadero in San Luis Obispo County.

According to Harrol Wiley, Vice Chair of the Board and who led the selection effort, Saldana’s experience combined with his national and statewide reputation as a leader in economic development, will be a wonderful leadership addition to the organization’s economic development efforts.  “Paul is well regarded among the profession at the national and state level, he knows the industries, has the contact, and understands the needs of the local communities”, Wiley stated.

Saldana has served in economic development positions at the city, county and regional level, serves on the Board of Directors of the American Economic Development Council (AEDC), and is an instructor at the University of Oklahoma’s Economic Development Institute, held annually in San Diego.  His is the recipient of 6 economic development awards from the California Association for Local Economic Development, 2 national awards and received the 1999 Distinguished Service Award from AEDC.  Saldana is familiar with the Central Valley, having spent 6 years in economic development in Kern County.

“Tulare County not only offers a wide variety of quality of life amenities, but is a central location for companies to locate and expand in California”, Saldana stated.  “Our job will be simple, to create a strong market identify for Tulare County and market the plentiful and hard working labor force, low operating costs and strong community support to corporate executives and the consultants who advise them” Saldana stated.

Sopac Tompkins, who has served as the Interim President since March of this year, will continue to serve in this capacity during the transition.  “She has been instrumental in furthering the strategic planning efforts for the organization and marketing the assets of the county in relation to economic development.  We have been very fortunate to have her talent, dedication, and leadership these past several months” stated Board Chairman Fred Lagomarsino.

Saldana will officially start on January 2, 2001 and will be formally introduced during the December Board of Directors meeting scheduled for December 20 at the EDC off ices in Tulare.

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At the beginning of the new citrus season, there is guarded optimism that this year will be better than last.  Perhaps to insure that there’s not a repeat of last year’s financial debacle, the industry’s largest player, Sunkist Growers, announced the departure of their president and CEO Vincent Lupinacci who had been on the job for about 2 ½ years.  The official line is that Lupinacci “found it necessary to move on for personal and family reasons,” in a statement released November 22.  But some who attended the board meeting say in fact Lupinacci was asked to quit.

Taking over for now is James Mast, an Arizona grower who has been on the Sunkist board since 1981.  Mast will be acting president while they search for a permanent replacement.

In December 1998 a major freeze hit California reducing volume 50% in the 98/99 growing season.  Many growers didn’t have the fruit to make money.  Last year’s season wasn’t much better even though we had lots of fruit, much of it small size.

The fruit matured late missing the Holiday selling season.  Some growers sent fruit to market too early spoiling their chance to make a good first impression on customers.  Meanwhile, two years of lost volume has meant oranges from California have lost shelf space to competitors, particularly from Europe.  The bottom line is many growers didn’t make money last year either.

But Sunkist grower/shipper Brad Stark says this season started out better.  “We’ve already picked and sold about 20% of our crop,” says Stark whose diverse line of speciality citrus varieties helps carry them through.  This year Stark says the fruit size is up and the amount of fruit on the trees down - a good combination.  The colder weather is helping to sweeten the fruit earlier as well.

“Demand is exceeding supply right now,” says Stark.  “We’re chasing the premium export market,” right now.  China’s new year is January 24.  China is a big market.

Stark says the acting president, James Mast, “knows the market, knows fruit and knows Sunkist inside and out.”  As to the departing president “it obviously didn’t work out,” he suggests.

Lupinacci came to the Sunkist job from Pepsi.  “We want a produce guy,” says a shipper.  Fewer hands on citrus growers is cause of alarm, say industry people who see perhaps as much as 50% of the groves owned by absentee owners.

There are other trends that make it harder to make money in a global marketplace.  Plenty of other countries are growing fruit.  The cheap cost of ocean shipping from Europe to the US making the East coast cheaper for Spain to reach with boatloads of mandarins, than it is to ship from California to NY.  Meanwhile, the high value of the dollar means “everybody wants to ship to this market.”

Despite all the barriers in the way of profitability, the good taste of our fruit is back this season and a shake-up at Sunkist may chart a new course to better returns for the 100 years old plus cooperative.  Cooperatives have had a tough time in recent years as can be seen just up the valley - TriValley Growers is selling their bankrupt business to an insurance company, it was announced this week.

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Tulare - Three farm related entities with local roots are working on a plan to take their programs to the next level by sharing and coordinating their future facility needs.

If it happens the familiar sea of red and white tents seen each year at Farm Show time in February could be replaced by a city of permanent buildings used all year round - what has been called and Ag Disneyland.
Others are suggesting World Ag Expo is more appropriate.

The Reined Cow Horse Association and Tulare County Fair are closer this month to partnering with the International Agri Center on an ambitious plan to build millions of dollars of joint use facilities at the Farm Show complex on Highway 99.

“We’re winding up our feasibility studies,” says  consultant Lynn Dredge, “getting down to particulars on both final physical configuration decisions and fiscal decisions” in coming weeks, he suggest.  Dredge, the former Tulare city manager, now consultant for both the property owner Manual Faria and the Agri Center, says all three parties could make a tentative decision to join up while they work out what part of the sprawling complex would be built right away and what part might be phased.

The three announced a formal feasibility study would be undertaken last year after months of informal discussions.  Two parallel studies involving facility layout and financial feasibility have been tracking each other.
While both the horse association and the Farm Show can make decisions independently, the Tulare County’s Fair decision making process may be more complicated.

Even if the Fair Board decided to join up it might take them some time to get state legal approvals to formally sign up, Dredge suggests.  Key would be what happens to the 55 acres existing Fairgrounds near downtown.
Still there is no doubt momentum for the project is building and Dredge himself is optimistic.  “I see some of the facilities ready to use in the next three to five years.”

Tops on that list would be a 7000 seat performance arena and a second large holding arena designed to the specifications of the National Reined Cow Horse Association (NRCHA) who hold their internationally known World Championship Snaffle Bit Futurity and many other horse shows throughout the year.  That show draws thousands of spectators and a purse of hundreds of thousands of dollars annually.  The Snaffle Bit Futurity is in its 31st year and has grown so popular that is broadcast each year by ESPN.

Dredge says the likely location for the arena would be next to the Dairy Pavilion in the middle of the Farm Show grounds.  “We’re talking a $12 to 15 million investment just in these facilities,” says Dredge.  And the NRCHA has indicated “they can raise the capital to do it.”

Dredge says he would characterize the NRCHA, who has their corporate office in Corcoran, as a strong player in this plan.

Dredge says the Farm Show and the Fair could all co-use these facilities as well as the parking and other facilities that the Fair might need to build or improvements the Farm  Show would build.  That may be the end to essentially mostly tent Farm Shows where all facilities are erected in a matter of days of the big February Farm Show and then taken down the next week.

“We’d be talking more permanent facilities,” says the World Ag Expo as it may be called would transform itself into a decidedly more upscale grounds from the dusty and sometimes muddy cotton field it is today.

The City of Tulare will soon weigh in with major improvements on Laspina over the next year.  Laspina is going to eventually be a 6 lane divided boulevard into the Expo grounds likely from a new freeway interchange a mile south of Paige.  (See other story.)  The city obtained $2 million in grant monies to make improvements and begin curb, gutter, sewer and water down from Paige that will allow the entire hundred of acres to be developed from Paige south.

The thing is that once this “partnership” is a done deal, the marketing of the surrounding lands for hotel, restaurant and other visitor uses  will begin in earnest.  Although preliminary decision with major hotel developers has already begun.

Visitor facilities are interested because it looks like the NRCHA will use the pavilion over many weekends during the year and that the ground may attract other venues.  It’s likely that some years from now there won’t be weekends when something is happening at the expo.

Add the International Trade Center into the mix, the new Heritage complex that includes an ag museum, and you get the sense that the facilities here on Highway 99 will receive constant use in part because leaders have subscribed to an “agri clustering” concept that includes the trade center, museum and learning center, AgTAC - Edison’s high tech irrigation facility which plans expansion as well and now office of the Tulare County Ag Commissioner and UC Cooperative Extension nearly complete and set to open by Farm Show time.  Nearby the UC/COS dairy facility and the Tulare Chamber sponsored speciality cheese facility and you see how this place is likely to need that freeway offramp soon.

Besides this feasibility study the Expo is allowing the results from two other city sponsored studies.  On the south Tulare corridor, how to configure freeway offramps along this route and a Quad Consultants study on the potential land uses in south Tulare.

Boosting the impact of the International Trade Center is a plan being proposed by former EDC president Bill Evans, now a local consultant, for steering all state leads requesting information about California agriculture through the Tulare Trade Center.  “We offer the state tours of agriculture anywhere in California.” Evans believes the State of California would rather job this task out anyway.  Hundreds of foreign delegations visit California each year coming to the biggest ag production in the world to see how it works.  Evans says they often come looking for specific needs and in up building relationships that benefit the local economy.

Before Evans left the EDC last August, he met with Mitsui representatives who had heard through the California Milk Advisory Board and an industry publication Cheese Market News, that Tulare was growing as a cheese production center.  Mitsui came and looked, indicating they were thinking of making a $100 million investment, and liked what they saw because a few months later the big Japanese conglomerate and Land O’Lakes announced a partnership on a new cheese and whey plant (now under construction) in town that will mean 140 jobs.

How close are the leaders of the Expo plan to making a decision?  The 2001 Farm Show is only a few months away and provides a dramatic backdrop to a possible announcement that this really big deal is going forward.

The Expo could be the biggest thing to hit Tulare since DCCA opened.  That was in 1909.

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Dinuba - The hulk of a burned out poultry processing plant in Dinuba will soon be demolished thanks to baby boomers nostalgia for 40's era toys.  Three Dinuba investors who also have a real estate partnership here have bought out old Zacky Farms plant that was mostly destroyed by a fire back in the mid 90s.  Thanks to strong international demand for the new company’s line of nostalgic pedal cars and Coke coolers, the firm is under construction on a new 16,000 sq. ft. warehouse on the property. It also uses another small warehouse left from Zacky.

Meanwhile, the city of Dinuba has agreed to demolish the burned out Zacky plant that covers the rest of the block in exchange for the city gaining right-of-way that will mean a new street into the old Chinatown area of Dinuba.  “It’s a good deal for everyone all around,” says city manager Ed Todd.

Partner Harold Newton credits Dave Johnston as the idea man in the three man partnership that also includes Jim Merlo.  The company is called fittingly, American-Retro (web site: american-retro.com).  Dave started a few years ago collecting old Coke machines and that turned into a passion.  Today he has “what may be the largest collection in the US,” says Newton.

From there the nostalgic ideas kept coming as Dave got permission from Coke to produce replicas of those old coolers those 50 and older remember from their youth.  They found a Korean manufacturer to make smaller versions of the coolers - six pack size - that you an carry with you on a picnic or to the beach.  The idea took off and he decided that other soft drink cooler might sell and they did.

Then about 18 months ago, the partnership got into full-size replicas of those nostalgic pedal cars from the 1940s knowing that every father he grew up with in that year would want one for the kid.  One design was not enough.
Top seller has been the 1940's era pedal pursuit plane (pictured).  The partnership has sold over 4000 of them n the past year.  Then about eight months ago they increased the line of pedal cars including the popular fire truck and an estate sedan.  A top new hot seller is a replica of the 1957 Gordini race car that comes in bright red and sells for $345.  Another pedal car costs less, $195 for the fire truck for example.

Right now only Dave works full-time at this enterprise, but the growth of the company and expansion of the new warehouse, will mean more jobs in Dinuba.  There are tentative plans to add another 10,000 sq. ft. to the new 16,000 sq. ft. warehouse that is nearing completion.

For Dinuba, the town gets another feather in its cap as a distribution center - for retail goods along with food processing (Odwalla/Ruiz Foods).  Ed Todd says punching Ventura St. through and new investment in the blighted block will be good for this older part of town that up to now “has had poor access,” says Todd.

Still Todd says Dinuba is not just counting on distribution, like the big Best Buy facility in town to provide jobs for the future.  He says he expects to hear this month if a planned vocational school might be funded by federal monies that will mean more locals can upgrade their skill levels for the work of tomorrow.

Meanwhile, Dinuba is proud of three local entrepreneurs who turned a blighted part of town into a sort of toy land.  You can buy the toys online or visit FAO Swartz in San Francisco or New York to buy one in person.

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December 6, 2000