Georgia-Pacific Plans To Restructure Distribution Division

In a rnove 0o improve service and cut costs, Georgia-Pacific is restructuring its building products distribution division beginning with a Southern region prototype utilizing new sales and logistics concepts.

A sales center based at a to-beselected site in or near Atlanta, Ga., will open next year to serve a market area currently covered by 15 distribution branches. Strategically located warehouse/delivery locations will support the sales center. New information systems re planned to speed delivery and provide better operational data.

Many of the 15 branches in Binningham, Huntsville and Montgomery, Al.; Little Rock, Ar.; Atlanta, Augusta Columbus and lvtacon, Ga; Asheville, N.C.; Bristol, Chattanooga Knoxville, Memphis and Nashville, Tn., and Greenville, S.C., will be closed in 1995.

Fine tuning of the new operation will take place during 1995 with a second Soutbem prototype anticipated by 1996. No time frame has been esablished for the West" according to a G-P spokesperson, but the concept could roll out approximately 18 to 7l months after the first Southem facility opens. G-P currently operates 140 distribution centers nationwide. The building products distribution unit employs 500 workers in the South and about 4,700 nationally.

Details including a name and a design for the mega sales center, which will have a business or office environment and accommodate large numbers of sales personnel, are still being worked out. At present the sales centers are envisioned as opefating longer hours than the branches have with a possibility of 24 hour delivery service.

"Georgia-Pacific is resEucturing its distribution division to ensure we continue as the leading distributor of building products in the country," Davis K. Mortensen, executive vice president-building products, said.

The restructuring is expected to grow the business to at least $7 billion by 2000. The division earned $4.9 billion last year with Gmrgia-Pacific tallying total 1993 revenue of $12.33 billion.

Additional market and product business units have been formed to manage procurement, inventories, pricing and new product development. These business units include specialty wood products, commodity lumber, structural panels, industriaVmanufactured housing and building poducts specialties.

George A. MacConnell, senior vice president-distribution and millwork, will lead the transition. Dtmcan B. Facey, group vice president-disribution division, has been named group vice president-sales and logistics, distribution division.

Regional vice presidents Joseph J. Armetta, Midwest and Western; Stephen K. Jackson, Northeast, and Robert A. Starling, Southern, will report to him. westem and Midwest regions will be combined after Kelly E. Powell Jr., vice president-Westem region, retires Oct. l.

Vice presidents assuming new responsibilities include William B. Nagle Jr., specialty wood products, and J. Wayne Amy, building products specialties. Jerry P. Collier continues as vice president-millwork. All will report to MacConnell.

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Portland House Demonstrates Wood ls "Green"

Hannony House, Portland, Or., is the lumber industry's answer to claims that other building products may be more environmenally friendly than wood.

"Wood products are a very environmencally conscious choice, and are the only building materials that come from a renewable resour@," says Bob Petow, executive director fu marketing and communications, Western Wood Products Association.

The house, whose name stands for "Man In Harmony With Nature," is constructed of dimensional lumber, plywood and other wood products. Home magazine is WWPA's partner in the project.

Steel, concrete, aluninum, plastic and wood all carry environmental burdens, according to Petow. "Wood carries significantly lower burdens over its life cycle when compared with altematives," he notes, with trees replaced at a rate of more than 1.7 billion every year.

Wood products, Petow says, are energy efficient. Other building products require at least nvice the energy for manufacturing and production. Actual energy burdens vary depending on the material as well as the specific application.

Pointing out the structural panels and glue-lminated beams and moldings used in Hamrony House, Petow explains engineered products such as these extend the effectiveness of the wood fiber. In addition some of these products are manufactured from faster growing, lower grade trees, further extending the wise use of the forest resource.

Wood products are unique among industrial raw materials because they serve as "carbon sinks." That is they remove carbon dioxide (a prevalent greenhouse gas) from the aunosphere and replace it with oxygen, storing the carbon in the wood fiber. The carbon remains in tbe wood fiber even after tle trees are processed, Pelow adds. For the house. builders used wood products as efficiently as possible, reducing waste with a computerized roof framing system, reusing scraps when possible and hauling all waste to recycling facilities.

Oregon Project Highlights Timber

Visitors to Coos Bay, Or., will be able to leam about the timber industry, shipping and the area's history from a boardwalk with three interpretive pavilions.

Approiimately 12,000 feet long and 16 feet wide, the boardwalk is part of the Coos Bay waterfront with ships moving in and out, along with tug boats, log rafts and wildlife. Cost of the project is $1,485,000, funded by the city's'lVo hoteVmotel room tax.

The first 78'x48' pavilion incorporates a tug boat donated by Knutson's Tugboat Co. Visitors can view the tug deck from a platform or walk into the vessel. Signs explain how tugs are used and their significance to the Coos Bay shipping industry.

The 40'x48'timber pavilion has wooden supports made fron a variety of species of woods indigenous to the south Oregon coast with their uses explained by interpretive signs. All woods were donated by local timber companies.

The third pavilion concentrates on Coos Bay history.

Lumber treated with Chemonite by Taylor Lumber & Wood Treating, Beaverton, Or., and Conrad Wood Preserving, North Bend, Or., was used for the boardwalk.

The Unimat 23 opens up endless possib'illites td work more efficientlv and creatively.

Forlnformation: Tel:7041872-9843

Fax: 7041873-0155

Michael Weinig,Inc. 1931 Weinig Street P.O.Box 5009 Statesville, NC 28687

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