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"If we talk about reasonable logging in a rational way so families and small communities can continue and so Americans can buy a house, somehow that gets translated to: kill every endangered species by Thursday morning."

- Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) Speaker of the House

Treater Aims For #1 Ranking

With the addition of its fifth and largest plant now under construction near Tuscumbia, Al., Great Southern Wood Preserving expects to eventually overtake Universal Forest Products on The Merchant Magazine's annual ranking of the Top 25 Treaters.

Having long held the number two slot behind Universal. whose 16 plants treated 564 million bd. ft. of lumber in 1995, Great Southern contends technology and efficiency advantages should allow it to become the nation's largest pressure treater with onlv five facilities.

New Laminating Division

Landmark Forest Products, San Bernardino, Ca., has added a new division, Tri-State Laminating Co., Chino, Ca., to produce custom and specialty laminated panels, according to Lance Duke, v.p./gen. mgr.

Serving California, Arizona and Nevada, the new plant is headed by sales mgr. Kevin Letson and operations mgr. Randy Nelson, both formerly with Quality Laminating, Pacoima, Ca.

Gilroy Preparing To Close

Family-owned Gilroy Lumber Co., Gilroy, Ca., is closing after 51 years.

Company president Mike Kennedy, whose father and grandfather founded the company in 1945, attributes the closure to a combination of factors, including a shrinking customer base of small local builders and land purchased for an expansion that never materialized.

The yard began an expected threemonth liquidation sale this month, discounting everything from lumber to hardware to forklifts. "We're not going to shrivel away," Kennedy says. "It will be an aggressive sale."

Door Opener Patent Suit

The Chamberlain Group, Inc. has filed a claim of patent infringement against Overhead Door Corp. and subsidiary GMI Holdings, Inc.

In 1988, Chamberlain patented its "learning code" technology that permits push-button reprogramming of garage door openers to a new remote control. Earlier, operators had to manually set numerous switches within the control in order to create their own code.

Plastic Film Packs Big Growth

U.S. plastic film demand should rise 3.3Vo annually to 14.4 billion lbs. worth nearly $16 billion in the year 2000, reports The Freedonia Group.

Over the next five years, the largest growth for the versatile packaging material will be in high density polyethylene, increasing 5.9V0 a year, followed by polypropylene film (4.l%o), low density polyethylene (2.9Vo), polyester (2.7Vo), and other resins (1.77o). Still, low density polyethylene will continue to dominate due to its low cost and diverse, large volume applications.