MARCH 2020

Going With Pine

Article by Jessica Johnson, Senior Associate Editor, Timber Processing

LAURINBURG, NC — Edwards Wood Products (EWP), founded in 1969 by Carroll Edwards, began as a small pallet manufacturer in an abandoned chicken house in Marshville, NC. Beginning at age 9, Jeff Edwards worked after school, swept the floors, stacked lumber at the turntable and learned the ropes. By the time he finished high school, Edwards knew his future was in the family business.

He says he never looked back after joining the business full-time. Working alongside his father as the company grew at an impressive clip was thrilling—adding its second sawmill in 1989, then three acquisitions before another greenfield startup in 2018—and knowing he’s kept his family’s business thriving for more than 50 years has been a source of real pride, especially now that his dad has passed.

Careful consideration of location has been a factor for continued growth. Edwards has mills spread across North Carolina and one in South Carolina, because procurement has always been a challenge. Not necessarily because of competition for hardwood, but mainly because of the large-scale pine operations in the region. Spreading mills out a bit helps take pressure off a tight procurement radius.

He’s a stone’s throw from some of the biggest single site pine sawmills in the country. EWP owns about 35,000 acres of timberland, mainly pine plantations, and it is not always cost effective to truck to the company’s new pine mill. Sometimes it makes more sense to sell pine logs off Edwards’ own timberlands to markets that are closer.

Edwards’ portfolio, which includes three scragg mills, two chip mills, five hardwood grade mills and the new pine mill, consumes around 350 loads of wood daily.

One of the driving factors in every single decision Edwards has made for the business has been how to get the highest and best use, while also being strategic in location of acquisitions of both land and sawmills. Those moves benefitted greatly in 2017, when he first began seriously planning a pine and mixed hardwood alternating sawmill designed to feed the company’s pallet operations —all of course driven by Edwards noticing that the market demand for kiln dried pine pallets was increasing, and his pallet operations were geared mainly for hardwoods.