Reference Publications

Columbia Forest Products Inc.

International Directory of Company Histories, Volume 78 (2007) by Carrie Rothburd

222 S.W. Columbia Street, Suite 1575 Portland, Oregon 97201 U.S.A. Telephone: (503) 224-5300 Toll Free: (800) 547-4261 Fax: (503) 224-5294 Web site: http://www.columbiaforestproducts.com

Private Company Incorporated: 1957 Employees: 4,000 Sales: $1 billion (2005 est.) NAIC: 321210 Veneer, Plywood, and Engineered Wood Product Manufacturing; 321211 Hardwood Veneer and Plywood Manufacturing; 321213 Engineered Wood Member (Except Truss) Manufacturing; 321910 Millwork; 423310 Lumber, Plywood, Millwork, and Wood Panel Merchant Wholsesalers

Columbia Forest Products Inc. is among North America's largest manufacturers of hardwood plywood and hardwood veneer. Through its subsidiary, Columbia Flooring, it is also a leading marketer of hardwood and laminate flooring. The 100 percent employee-owned company makes products used in flooring, cabinets, architectural millwork, and commercial fixtures. The company has 20 plants throughout the United States and Canada and sells its products through a network of distributors, mass merchandisers, cabinet makers and furniture manufacturers, and independent dealers across the continent. Its products can be milled upon request to bear the FSC ecolabel.

ORIGINS

In 1957, A. J. Honzel and a small group of businessmen purchased a defunct mill south of Klamath Falls, Oregon. They opened Klamath Hardwoods, which produced hardwood plywood. The mill was initially a cooperative, financed in part by its 43 employees.

Honzel remained president of Klamath Hardwoods until 1962. He died in 1993. In 1963, Columbia Plywood Corporation, a holding company, was formed to purchase Klamath Hardwoods. Operations continued as usual until 1966, when the company purchased a company called Indian Head and acquired hardwood veneer operations in Presque Isle, Maine, and Newport, Vermont. Then, in 1976, employees purchased the company from Columbia Plywood Corporation and reorganized the company as an Employee Stock Ownership Plan. They changed its name to Columbia Forest Products Inc.

1990: CONSOLIDATING A NORTH AMERICAN PRESENCE

The 1990s were another decade of strong growth and nationwide expansion for Columbia. In 1990, it built a poplar core veneer plant in Craigsville, West Virginia. In 1995, the International Division began exporting hardwood plywood. In 1996, the company purchased Levesque Plywood in Hearst, Ontario, giving the company a larger presence in the Canadian marketplace. The Levesque division of Columbia Forest Products consisted of four separate operations: a plywood mill, a particle board plant, a melamine overlay mill, and a hardwood plywood mill. Columbia also acquired two other hardwood plywood plants in Danville, Virginia, and DeQueen, Arkansas in 1996. That year, too, the Laminated Product Division became Columbia Flooring, a subsidiary of the company.

Harry Demorest left his position as managing partner at Arthur Anderson and Co. and became chief executive officer of Columbia in 1996, having joined the company in 1991, and serving as its president from 1994 to 1996. Under Demorest, Columbia continued its focus on expansion through acquisition; it acquired a hardwood plant in Cuthbert, Georgia, in 1997 and also purchased a veneer raised panel and door insert plant in Corpus Christi, Texas. The company's Columbia Flooring subsidiary acquired an equity position in Arkansas-based Century Flooring in 1999. However, Columbia also engaged in some plant closings: In 1998, it closed the DeQueen, Arkansas, hardwood plywood plant, and, in 1999, it closed the New Freedom, Pennsylvania, slicing plant, laying off 210 workers.

2000: A FOCUS ON GREEN CERTIFICATION

In the late 1990s, so-called green certification became a hot topic in the lumber products industry as European wood buyers, Home Depot, Nike, and a number of other large American companies declared a preference for buying certified wood. The FSC, an internationally recognized organization, promoted sustainable, environmentally sound forest management. Its oversight ensured consistent reforestation, more selective harvesting, enhanced biodiversity, better road construction, special site protection, and forester and contractor training. As of late 1999, there were about 45 million forested acres under FSC certification, including 6.4 million acres in the United States. Logs from these forests were followed under chain-of-custody procedures so that customers could be sure that the products they bought were "green." In 1999, Columbia joined the FSC, and its Klamath Falls plant began producing plywood using logs harvested from FSC certified lands. It was also named Home Depot's Environmental Leader of the Year award.

From 1999 on, Columbia introduced a certified and/or environmentally progressive product each year. In 2000, it won certification of its plywood from Smart-Wood, a program of the Rainforest Alliance accredited by the FSC and began offering a line of environmentally certified hardwood plywood and particle board. By the middle of the next decade, the company's mills in Arkansas, Maine, North Carolina, Virginia, Ontario, and Quebec produced certified products as well. With certified core material making up 92 percent of finished panel volume, most of the company's hardwood veneers met FSC labeling requirements.