Business Alabama - October 2024

OCT 2024

TO THE

MOON

CORKY CLINTON IS AMONG THOSE AT NASA EXPLORING WAYS WE CAN BUILD A HABITAT IN SPACE

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REGIONS HONORED

16 FOR EXPORT EXPERTISE

BUSINESS 49 BIRMINGHAM BUILT ON DOG TREATS SPOTLIGHT ON

53 THE SHOALS

OCTOBER 2024 BusinessAlabama.com Volume 39 / Number 10

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Volume 39 / Number 10

OCTOBER 2024

CONTENTS

16

Carson Strickland and his team helped Regions land a President’s “E” Award for Export Service. Photo by Mike Kittrell.

Features 12

16 20

27

BANKING & FINANCE BANKING MEETS WEALTH MANAGEMENT LifeSteps aims to help clients use their capital to meet whatever life sends next EXPORT EXPERTS Regions honored for supporting international trade ACQUISITIONS FUEL WAVERLY ADVISORS GROWTH Warren Averett spinoff now ranks as second-largest advisory firm in Alabama INNOVATION LIVING ON THE MOON NASA project based in Huntsville is testing ways to build roads, houses and launching pads on the moon

4 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

31

AVIATION & AEROSPACE HELPING ALABAMA TAKE FLIGHT The Alabama Department of Commerce uses international air shows to showcase Alabama industry

49

MANUFACTURING DOGGED DETERMINATION Dewar Gaines’ journey to multimillion-dollar pet brand

82

RETROSPECT ROAD TRIP The rise and fall of the Preston Motors Corp. Premocar

6

On the Cover: Corky Clinton is one of the leaders of a NASA team at work in Huntsvllle to figure out how to build on the moon. Photo by David Higginbotham.

49

6: A massive project to deepen and widen shipping channels at the port in Mobile nears completion.

49: Dewar Gaines shows off the dog treats that have boosted his Gaines Family Farmstead to the ranks of the nation’s fastest-growing companies. Photo by Cary Norton.

31: Sen. Katie Britt helped promote Alabama for potential investors at the Farnborough International Air Show.

Departments 6

81

TOP RANK 19 BANK PERFORMANCES 34 AEROSPACE & AVIATION COMPANIES

84

GEOGRAPHIC SPOTLIGHT 53 THE SHOALS SPECIAL SECTIONS 23 BUSINESS COUNCIL OF ALABAMA 35 BANKING’S RISING STARS 73 COMPTRUST AGC

86 87

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BENCHMARKS: MONTHLY BUSINESS NEWS BRIEFING COMPANY KUDOS: A MONTH OF ACHIEVEMENTS BA INDEX: HUNDREDS OF LEADS EACH MONTH CAREER NOTES: WHO’S MOVING UP HISTORIC ALABAMA: A WALK DOWN MEMORY LANE ALABIZ QUIZ: TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 5

Benchmarks

Baldwin County industrial park opens to serve Mobile port Baldwin County officials broke ground in late August on the PORT ALABAMA INDUSTRIAL CENTER in Loxley. Phase 1 will have 2 million square feet of space available for potential industrial development.

The 900-acre site is just south of I-10 along highways 59 and 90. The site will be developed in three phases with plans for it to contain approximately 12 million square feet of Class A industrial space, close to the Port of Mobile.

“The master plan for Port Alabama Industrial Center, which will initially offer abundant space to support significant new industry, is bringing the much-needed industrial product to market,” said Baldwin County Economic Development Alliance President and CEO Lee Lawson. “There has been increasing demand for Class A industrial space in our area for many years as Baldwin County continues to grow and as the Port of Mobile continues to expand. Having readily available sites like our site here is essential as we continue attracting businesses and economic projects to Baldwin County.”

Gulf Corp., a Dallas-based real estate development and investment firm, acquired the property, which had not changed hands since the mid-1800s, according to Austin Ames, Gulf Corp.

CEO. “We believe our planned development activities will be the tip of the iceberg in the logistics and industrial capabilities of the entire Gulf Coast,” said Ames. “With the migration shift to

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PIER PLEASURE Nine months after closing for repair and renovations, the Gulf State Park Fishing and Education Pier has opened again to the public. The pier closed three years after Hurricane Sally caused extensive damage to the pier in 2020.

has pledged to invest $3 billion in older mills.

END OF AN ERA Long-time Troy University Chancellor Jack Hawkins Jr. has announced plans to retire and become chancellor emeritus as of October 2025.

STEELY THREAT U.S. Steel, which has a mill in Fairfield, says it may close U.S. steel mills if a planned $14.1 billion sale to Nippon Steel doesn’t happen. David Burritt, chief executive of U.S. Steel, told The Wall Street Journal the Japanese company

ROLLIN’ ON THE RIVER A piece of rocket hardware that at some point should help us travel to the moon is on a barge from Huntsville to Florida via the Tennessee River. The launch vehicle stage adapter is part of the Space Launch System, connecting the rocket’s core stage to its upper stage.

BIGGER & BETTER SSAB, the international steel company, plans to invest $12 million in its Mobile operations. The investment will lead to a bigger furnace, allowing the company to increase its output.

NEW AT THE TOP In a major leadership change at Alabama’s largest general

6 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

An aerial view of the Port Alabama Industrial Center site between highways 90 and 59 in Loxley in Baldwin County.

the southern region due to positive economic tailwinds as well as post-COVID ‘on-shoring,’ we are on the precipice of a major shift in how the nation and world view this region. With the growth of the port in conjunction with the substantial growth of the area, Port Alabama Industrial Center is primed to become one of the nation’s major industrial centers.”

Baldwin County officials agree with Ames. “The close proximity to I-10 and the centralized location in Baldwin County between Mobile and Pensacola will attract quality tenants that will provide good, high-paying jobs for the citizens of not only Baldwin County, but the entire Southwest region of Alabama,” said Baldwin County Commission Chair Billie Jo Underwood. 

contractor, Rob Blalock will become CEO of Brasfield & Gorrie. Jim Gorrie will become executive chairman; Todd Jackson will be the new president. Miller Gorrie continues to lead the firm’s trust. Cameron Espy will be the new executive director of the Alabama State Employees Association on the retirement Nov. 1 of Mac McArthur after 26 years as executive director.

Alex Wyatt will become mayor of Homewood Nov. 1, after the retirement of Patrick McClusky.

Meghann Bridgeman, CEO of Create Birmingham, has been named director of the Alabama Film Office. She’ll begin the job with the Alabama Department of Commerce in January. Casey Foster has been named executive director of the Alabama Clean Fuels

Coalition, following Mark Bentley, who retired earlier this year.

COLLEGE WOE Talladega College said in early September that it is in “significant debt,” and the oldest private historically Black college in Alabama has announced a strategic plan to try and overcome it. Pillars of the strategic plan include financial integrity and stability, academic excellence and integrity, recruitment and retention.

PINE POACHERS Outbreaks of the Southern pine beetle, which can destroy timber harvests, are the worst they’ve been in more than 20 years. The Alabama Forestry Commission has issued an alert about the pine beetle, which can be problematic across the state.

BENCHMARKS

Teledyne Brown gets $114M task order for missile production TELEDYNE BROWN ENGINEERING, in Huntsville, has been

awarded a $114 million task order from the U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command to design, build and launch ballistic target missiles used in testing the nation’s missile defense systems.

“These target missiles are vital to ensuring the effectiveness of our defense systems in an increasingly perilous world,” said Scott Hall, president of Teledyne Brown Engineering.

The Tactical Range Air Defense Missile (TACRAM) 2, a follow-on contract, will extend through March 2028, continuing the company’s work under Teledyne Brown’s a previous contract, providing complex in Huntsville. target missiles since 2014. The TACRAM 2 contract introduces innovative designs and enhanced capabilities, replicating the rapidly evolving threats faced by American warfighters.

Teledyne Brown Engineering, a subsidiary of Teledyne Technologies Inc., is an engineering and advanced manufacturing solutions firm serving space, defense and energy industries.

B U S I N E S S

B R I E F S

WATER GRANT The Environmental Protection Agency has awarded Birmingham Water Works a $171 million grant to improve its infrastructure, particularly in the Lake Purdy Dam and replacement of lead service lines.

ELECTRIC TRANSFER Vehicles from Honda’s plant in Lincoln will now head for the CSX railhead on an electric Peterbilt tractor-trailer from Virginia Transportation Corp. It’s a joint project among Peterbilt, Alabama Power, the Alabama Clean Fuels Coalition and Virginia Transportation.

ON CAMPUS Beginning in the spring, Northwest Shoals Community College will offer a medical laboratory technology program leading to an associate degree.

Huntsville-based Alabama A&M University expects 7,000 students this fall, a record number.

PARK FANCY A $25 million hotel will be coming to Cheaha State Park, replacing a 50-year-old building at one of the park’s overlooks.

The hotel is expected to be completed in 2025.

TECH SCHOOL Central Alabama Community College in Talladega has been awarded a $200,000 federal Expanded Industrial Training and Assessment Center grant to establish a program in industrial electronics technology.

SCHOOL STATS The Alabama Community College System says more than 170,000 residents enrolled in academic or adult education and workforce training programs between August 2023 and July 2024 — the highest numbers since 2013.

STEM SUPPORT Huntsville’s HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology has been awarded a federal grant of up to $1 million to support STEM educational programs in local middle and high schools.

SHIPSHAPE Mobile’s Austal USA has christened the future USNS Point Loma. The ship is the 15th of 16 expeditionary fast transports the U.S. Navy has contracted Austal to build.

GROWING GROUP This year’s Inc. 5000 list of fastest growing companies included 46 Alabama-based firms. Huntsville IT firm LaunchTech ranked highest at 260.

TENANT TEAM AE Shoals Manufacturing & Technology Center in Muscle Shoals has partnered with Montgomery’s Jim Wilson & Associates to help develop tenants for the 642-acre AE Shoals site.

GOMESA FUNDING More than $30 million in Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act funds have been distributed to 25 Alabama projects. Parks in Mobile and Spanish Fort, a sewer system on Dauphin Island and the National Maritime Museum each received more than $2 million from the program that’s funded by offshore oil and gas leases.

BIRTHDAY PLANS Jimmy Rane, founder and chairman of Great Southern Wood Preserving, which

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 7

BENCHMARKS

Austal starts work on multi-billion-dollar Coast Guard cutter contract

U.S. Coast Guard and Austal USA officials gathered to kick off construction of the future USCGC Pickering, the first cutter to be built at Austal.

U.S. COAST GUARD and AUSTAL USA officials gathered at the

riverfront shipyard in Mobile in late August to begin construction on an Offshore Patrol Cutter destined to be the USCGC Pickering.

This is the first cutter under a contract that will include up

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B R I E F S

is based in Abbeville, has been named to the U.S. Semiquincentennial Commission, planning for the country’s 250th anniversary on July 4, 2026.

Romeo cars in Irondale, has closed and is in the process of selling to the Hallmark Auto Group, which will use the site to sell Subarus. The 225,763-square-foot Macy’s at Birmingham’s Riverchase Galleria — the last Macy’s in Alabama — is for sale.

NEW MANAGEMENT Vertical Cold Storage, based in Kansas City, Missouri, has acquired a frozen distribution center in Dothan. The Dothan facility opened in April 2019, with a primary focus on providing export services to poultry producers. B.R. Williams Trucking and B.R. Williams LTL Logistics, based in Oxford, have been acquired

by Kentucky-based Haney and White Enterprise.

SAY GOODBYE Benchmark Automotive, which sold Maserati, Fiat and Alfa

GROUNDBREAKING Birmingham-based contractor Robins & Morton has broken ground on the $573 million Terrell State Hospital in Texas.

The 250-bed project replaces a 139-year-old psychiatric hospital. The Sanders Trust, a Birmingham real estate investment and development company specializing in health care, has broken ground on a 36-bed, $31 million ClearSky Rehabilitation Hospital in

8 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

to 11 cutters and a value of up to $3.3 billion.

The offshore patrol cutter is designed to bridge the gap between the open ocean national security cutters and the fast response cutters that operate closer to shore.

“Austal USA is excited to begin construction on the first of these high-priority cutters for the U.S. Coast Guard,” said Dave Growden, vice president of new construction programs. “This contract exemplifies the flexibility of our workforce and importance of our steel panel line to Austal USA’s future success.

Our multi-talented shipbuilders are well prepared to demonstrate their capability to produce the same high-quality steel ship as they have been producing for our aluminum programs.”

Describing the 360-foot OPC, Austal noted that it has a range of 10,200 nautical miles at 14 knots and is expected to be used for law enforcement, search and rescue, homeland security and other purposes such as hurricane response.

Lake City, Florida. The City of Montgomery has started construction on the Calmar Community Center, a $2.5 million, 5,000-square-foot facility with meeting rooms and classrooms that’s expected to open in 2025.

PROPERTY SALES Birmingham-based Medical Properties Trust has sold 11 freestanding health care facilities in Colorado to University of Colorado Health for $80 million. The facilities include emergency department, primary care, imaging and urgent care facilities. The Birmingham-based public company has been at odds with former client, Steward Health Care, which is facing bankruptcy.

CYBER WINNER Hunter Wittenborn, a sophomore computer science major at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, won the 2024 Department of Energy CyberForce competition based around cybersecurity.

He beat 149 students from 77 universities and colleges across the U.S. HOT PROPERTY Florence’s GunRunner Boutique Hotel is the nation’s best boutique hotel, according to USA Today’s 10Best survey.

The hotel has only 10 suites, each celebrating the history and people of the region.

AIRPORT FUNDS The Mobile Airport Authority has received a $7.5 million grant for a terminal at the Mobile International Airport.

BENCHMARKS

Mobile port expansion enters final phase

Looking north along the port toward downtown Mobile.

The final phase of a five-year project to modernize the PORT OF MOBILE has begun. When it’s complete in early 2025, the state

port will be the deepest on the Gulf of Mexico with a three-mile passing lane for massive cargo ships.

APM Terminals, which operates containerized shipping at the port, has added two new ship-to-shore cranes, a $40 million investment.

“Once complete, this project will provide a major advantage to shippers, creating even more opportunity for economic development, not just in Mobile but across our state and region,” said Director and CEO John Driscoll.

“Vessel operators seek economies of scale through deploying larger ships and prioritize calling ports with the capability of handling these larger ships. After vessels transit the Panama Canal, we expect Mobile to be the first port of call in the Gulf because of our 50-foot depth. This means more cargo will be offloaded in Alabama, and then the vessels will go on to more shallow Gulf ports,” said the port’s Chief Commercial Officer Beth Branch. “Beyond the increased depth, cargo owners know that when their container lands in Mobile, it will be moving through one of the most efficient container terminals in the U.S., which has the capacity and fluidity to get cargo to its destination quickly.”

Moreover, dredge material from the massive project has been dedicated to three projects, all identified as beneficial in an assessment by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers at the start of the

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The money comes from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law Airport Infrastructure Grant program.

out – placement of the final steel beam – for the headquarters for the Okaloosa Gas District in Valparaiso, Florida.

STARTUP STARS NephSol Inc. and Zone Products won Cycle 2 of this year’s Alabama Launchpad competition. Medical products firm NephSol won the $25,000 concept stage award and insect repellent maker Zone Products won the early seed stage award of $50,000.

UNHEALTHY FINANCE Montgomery’s Jackson Hospital & Clinic has defaulted on $60 million worth of bonds, leading S&P Global to lower its bond rating to D. The Medical Clinic Board of the City of Montgomery series 2015 bonds comprise about 86% of the hospital’s long-term debt.

OPEN WIDE The University of Alabama at Birmingham has plans to open a new dental clinic in Decatur in 2026 at Decatur Morgan Hospital’s Parkway Campus.

MERGERS & ACQUISITIONS Daphne-based BBB Industries has acquired All Star Auto Parts, based in Orlando, Florida.

BBB is a manufacturer serving the automotive and industrial markets. Pennsylvania Steel Co. has acquired Birmingham-based Besco Steel Supply.

UNDER CONSTRUCTION Birmingham-based Robins & Morton celebrated the topping

modernization.

Dredge material has been designated for the Dauphin Island Causeway, Deer River and Relic Shell.

“Dauphin Island benefits not only from the Port’s economic impact but also from the environmentally beneficial use of material from projects like the deepening and widening,” said Dauphin Island Mayor Jeff Collier. “With the breakwaters complete and thanks to a partnership between Mobile County, the Port and the Corps, the shoreline restoration of our causeway — which is the only way on or off Dauphin Island by road — is now ready to take material from phase six of the harbor project.

Separately, we plan to continue working with the Corps on beach replenishment efforts using material dredged from regular ship channel maintenance.”

“The Alabama Port Authority serves all 67 counties in the state of Alabama and oversees the deep-water public port facilities at the Port of Mobile,” the port said in announcing the next steps of the project. “In addition to interstate, air and rail, the Port Authority’s container, general cargo and bulk facilities have immediate access to nearly 15,000 miles of inland waterways.”

DENTAL DEAL Sage Dental, based in Boca Raton, Florida, has opened two new practices in Alabama.

The two practices are in the Birmingham area in Vestavia Hills and Gardendale.

BIZ FAME William C. Hulsey of Arlington Properties, Robert Earl Kelly of Kelly Road Builders and Kelly Natural Gas Pipeline and W. Stancil Starnes of ProAssurance have been inducted into the Kiwanis Club of Birmingham’s Birmingham Business Hall of Fame.

DRUG DEAL Birmingham-based ProxsysRx has forged an agreement with Yuma Regional Medical Center in Arizona for an off-campus pharmacy. ProxsysRx will build and own the Yuma Regional

Medical Cetner Foothills Pharmacy, its 17th ownedand-managed health system pharmacy.

MORE MOTION Birmingham-based Motion Industries is opening a repair shop in Houston, Texas. The facility is scheduled to open in September.

HAIL & FAREWELL Haig Wright II, president and CEO of Jasper-based Byars Wright and CEO of WRM Group, died in August at age 64.

Wright also served as president of the Alabama Independent Insurance Agents.

CORRECTION Sports journalist Ivan Maisel is a graduate of Stanford University.

BA inadvertently listed the wrong school in our August issue.

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 9

BENCHMARKS

A massive cargo ship at the Port of Mobile.

Trade group seeks to tax Chinese shipbuilding, boost American work

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Industry owners and trade unions have joined forces to promote a national penalty on Chinese-built ships, with hopes of boosting American shipbuilding at the same time.

Scott Paul, president of the ALLIANCE FOR AMERICAN MANUFACTURING — a trade group that claims both corporate and union members — talked with Business Alabama about an initiative that’s now in Congressional hearings, designed to level the playing field.

China today makes the vast majority of the world’s commercial oceangoing vessels, said Paul, whose organization counts both U.S. Steel and the United Steel Workers among its members.

“China’s shipbuilding capacity is 232 times larger than the U.S. capacity to build ships,” Paul said. “China is regularly manufacturing more than 1,000 ocean going vessels a year, sometimes 1,200, sometimes more than that. In the United States, the total is usually between 5 and 12. That’s a big disparity.”

In written testimony on the issue, the Shipbuilders Council of America noted that, “For the first time, China has also surpassed the combined market share of shipyards in Japan and South Korea.”

The U.S. shipbuilding supplier base has shrunk by 20,500 firms in the last two decades, because of the rapid decline of the industry.

The U.S. stopped subsidizing shipbuilding in the 1980s, Paul says. “We

took our foot off the gas at the same time others were accelerating.”

China, by contrast, has a three-fold subsidy program — it subsidizes steel, it subsidizes shipbuilding and it requires that state-owned oil firms use Chinesebuilt ships. “So, subsidies across the board makes a triple whammy,” Paul says.

THE U.S. SHIPBUILDING SUPPLIER BASE HAS SHRUNK BY 20,500 FIRMS IN THE LAST TWO DECADES, BECAUSE OF THE RAPID DECLINE OF THE INDUSTRY. In response, U.S. trade groups have petitioned for relief and that petition is now in review, with action expected by spring of 2025.

One possible relief, Paul says, is a “docking fee” that would charge a premium on Chinese built ships using American ports. Proceeds of the fee would support workforce development and also subsidize U.S. shipbuilding companies.

According to Paul, even a $1 million fee would be “negligible” when divided across the amount of goods carried on a typical cargo ship. And, he contends, it wouldn’t hurt trade in general because exporters want to bring their goods to the American market. October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 11

BANKING & FINANCE

Key team members for a new bank — [from left] Banking Executive Jeff Wilson, President John Johnson and CEO Hill Womble.

12 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

BANKING MEETS WEALTH MANAGEMENT LifeSteps aims to help clients use their capital to meet whatever life sends next

By KATHERINE MacGILVRAY — Photos by DENNIS KEIM

I

n January 2024, a small investor group acquired Union Springs-based Community Bank & Trust and rebranded it as LifeSteps Bank & Trust.

The group was led by Henry Ford, who is the principal and senior adviser for LifeSteps Financial, a registered investment advisory based in Claremont, California; Hill Womble, chief executive officer; and Adam Russell, a director.

Today, the LifeSteps executive team also includes President and Chief Credit Officer John Johnson and Chief Financial Officer Dana Potts.

The bank’s goal is to be a commercial bank that works hand-in-hand with a wealth management office, says Womble, who has been in banking more than 30 years — most recently as president, CEO and director of Merit Bank in Huntsville, where he is credited with growing the bank’s total assets from $25 million to more than $155 million between March 2019 and December 2020.

The reasoning behind this twopronged approach, he says, is in part to address the financial needs of what is being called the “silver tsunami.” The term refers to the large number of baby boomers reaching retirement age — an estimated 10,000 Americans are turning 65 every day, and the trend is expected to continue through 2050. With it comes an enormous amount of wealth transfer estimated to be between $60 and $70 trillion over the next 25 years.

“

you have this baby boomer generation that has been running companies and building companies, and at some point in the near future they’re reaching that retirement age, and they need an exit strategy along with a plan for the next phase of life.”

— Hill Womble, chief executive officer

“So, what that means to us is you have this baby boomer generation that has been running companies and building companies, and at some point in the near future they’re reaching that retirement age, and they need an exit strategy along with a plan for the next phase of life,” says Womble.

The form that exit takes, whether it’s an employee stock ownership plan (ESOP), selling the company outright or passing it down to family members, creates different opportunities and different needs, and that’s where the LifeSteps wealth management office comes in.

For example, the person exiting the company needs to be bought out, Womble explains, and they’ll likely need advice on how to handle the money they’ll be receiving and the timing of it, what kind of taxes are going to be involved and what kind of financial plans they may want to put in place for the next generation.

“We believe this to be a unique and wonderful opportunity to support these relationships with their commercial banking needs and support them as they move into a new phase of life with different needs as they exit their business. We like the idea of supporting both sides of the equation. They have known their banker for a while and under this approach, they don’t have to leave the relationship, they simply add to it,” says Womble.

Womble is quick to add that this idea October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 13

isn’t new, but that often these situations are handled by much bigger national banks and on behalf of larger companies.

“They’ve done it for decades, and we recognize that we’re not a three- or fouror five-decade-year-old bank; we will be a newer bank. But we do have a lot of relationships [with companies] that we can easily put a finger on that in the next few years will be transferring $10, $15, $20, $25 million and would prefer not to have to start over building a new relationship with a new financial service provider.

They know that we care.”

“It really starts with building a strong, safe and stable commercial bank to attract those customers that are involved heavily with growing their business and growing their family enterprises,” adds Johnson, who has more than 25 years of banking experience and most recently served in roles focused on commercial and small business credit during his 12-year tenure at Regions Bank.

One thing Johnson thinks sets LifeSteps apart in a crowded banking market is its ability to provide a more person-to-person approach to addressing their clients’ needs.

“Even in a day and age where banks are [operating] more like technology companies than financial institutions, we think we can bring more of that consultative expertise found in high-worth- or middle-market-style conversations and enterprises down to the small and medium business and the entrepreneur segment.” That, he continues, will build a high degree of trust. “And then, as we grow, we’ll introduce wealth management to those same customers.”

LifeSteps is a state-chartered branch, and, while the original Union Springs location will remain open, the financial institution will be headquartered in Huntsville. Renovations are currently underway at an office on Church Street near downtown Huntsville, with plans to be fully operational by the end of the year.

Johnson says they are excited about moving to Huntsville and the broader North Alabama market. “It’s a great place and a hotbed for the exact kind of business thesis that we’ve identified.

Huntsville finds itself with double-digit 14 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

“

We’re going to be a commercial bank, not a community bank.

But what we want to do is build community — community within our team and within our clientele.”

— John Johnson, President

growth in both population and deposits for the last several years, and that’s going to continue.”

For Womble, the allure of Huntsville’s development and economic strength goes without saying.

“I think a quick review of our board members gives some insight into our kind of model and how we’re trying to build it,” he says, pointing to Board Chairman Kelli Powers, who is CEO of the Decatur Morgan Hospital System and was former-

ly chief financial officer of the Huntsville Hospital Health System. “When we talk about a healthy community, we’ve got a very key, influential person [who plays] a key role in the community and also a key role on our board.”

Board Vice Chairman Patrick Frawley has spent some 50 years in banking, including work as a bank regulator for the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and executive roles in corporate banking.

Another board member, Rich Raleigh, is a partner in the Huntsville office of Womble Bond Dickson, an international law firm where he focuses on government contracts, employment law, complex business litigation and civil litigation. He is also a former president of the Alabama State Bar. And Madison native Ronnie Williams is CEO of Timber Products Inspection Inc., a company headquartered in Peachtree City, Georgia, that provides inspection and testing services for the forest products industry in 49 states and internationally.

“Hill and I and many of our board members have a real concentration of experience here in dealing with the economy and the facets of the Huntsville and broader North Alabama market,” says Johnson.

And while the solidity of its board is something they both say strengthens their business model, ultimately, they agree, it’s all about fostering a healthy community and a deep level of trust with their clients.

“We want to make sure we’re providing a high degree of connectivity between our customers as well as the resources within the bank,” says Johnson — for example, introducing clients who operate within the same supply chain or industry to each other or connecting a business that’s experiencing a financial or operational problem with another business who may be able to provide a solution.

“We’re going to be a commercial bank, not a community bank,” Johnson says.

“But what we want to do is build community — community within our team and within our clientele.”

Katherine MacGilvray and Dennis Keim are Huntsville-based freelance contributors to Business Alabama.

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 15

BANKING & FINANCE

Carson Strickland, head of the Regions Global Trade Finance Relationship team, in his office in downtown Mobile.

EXPORT EXPERTS Regions honored for supporting international trade

A

By DEBORAH STOREY — Photos by MIKE KITTRELL

bale of North Alabama cotton sails on a ship for a month on its way to Vietnam. Workers there fashion it into a men’s shirt, pack it up and ship it back to a buyer for a retail store in Mobile.

That’s not a farfetched scenario, say Alabama bankers who earned a prestigious award for helping make the remarkably complex world of importing and exporting easier for businesses.

Birmingham-based Regions Bank is

16 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

one of 10 U.S. entities recognized with the nation’s highest export service honor — the 2024 President’s “E” Award for Export Service for providing financial solutions for corporate banking clients.

“Our focus at Regions Bank is helping business clients maximize opportunities for growth, and our work with exporters helps American businesses expand their global reach while building on their success,” says Ronnie Smith, head of Corporate Banking for Regions.

A 1961 executive order created the “E” Award as the highest recognition a person or entity can receive for making a significant contribution to the expansion of American exports in the global marketplace.

“Regions Bank has a strong legacy of supporting vibrant trade,” says Carson Strickland, head of the Regions Global Trade Finance Relationship team. Strickland is based in Mobile and has been with Regions for more than 25 years.

BANKING & FINANCE

Regions works with all types of exporters, he says, mostly in the Regions footprint of the Southeast, Midwest and Texas but elsewhere in the country as well. Many of the exported products come from agricultural production.

“The large majority are manufacturing something or distributing something internationally, or selling something another company makes,” he says.

“There are at least a couple of hundred companies that we support of all sizes,” Strickland says, “from your mom-andpop businesses up to your Fortune 10 companies at this point.”

Exported materials travel anywhere they can be sold.

“If you think about your kind of base product exports, you think about your commodities and raw materials and things like that, they go all over the world,” Strickland says. “I would say more

of that goes into emerging or developing economies.

“We just produce as a country a lot more than what we use,” Strickland says.

American businesses, including those in Alabama, have plenty to sell internationally.

In February, Gov. Kay Ivey announced that Alabama’s exported goods and services were worth more than $27.4 billion in 2023, setting a new record. The state’s largest export market is Germany, followed by Canada.

Transportation equipment, which includes motor vehicles, auto parts, ships and aerospace products, remains Alabama’s No. 1 export category, totaling $14.8 billion.

Other categories registering more than $1 billion in exports during 2023 were minerals and ores ($2.2 billion), chemicals ($2.2 billion) and primary metals ($1.8 billion), according to Alabama Department of Commerce data.

Alabama exports went to 190 countries in 2023, landing everywhere from the world’s biggest economies to tiny locations like the Solomon Islands, Palau and Gibraltar, data shows.

Higher-value exports and products, like capital equipment, consumer goods and food products tend to go to more developed markets like North America, Europe and Japan, Strickland explains.

Bryan Ford, head of treasury management in the Regions Memphis office, has worked at Regions for more than 17 years.

“In the agriculture space, we have a fairly deep relationship with the cotton industry,” Ford says, and quite a bit of the region’s cotton is exported globally.

As a country, “we produce 20-something million bales of cotton a year,” Strickland says. “We use about 3 domestically and the rest of it goes somewhere else.”

A lot of basic manufacturing has moved into southern Asia, in countries like Pakistan, Bangladesh and Vietnam.

“Those types of countries buy a lot of commodities, agricultural and otherwise, from the U.S. to produce products that get sold to consumers all over the world,” Strickland says.

Ford says, “It really does span the

world, just depending on the client and what it is they’re producing and exporting.

“We often are helping our clients because many are looking to expand their business beyond the U.S. and domestic opportunities,” Ford adds. “They’re looking internationally. Sometimes one of the first questions that Carson’s team will get is, ‘How do I start?,’ ‘How do I do this?’

That’s where we’re able to help clients understand what resources and tools are available through Regions Bank to help them with that strategic goal they have of exporting their goods.”

Regions’ global trade finance options include treasury management to improve cash flow and mitigate risk, letters of credit to support contracts with foreign buyers, working capital solutions, and financing to help international companies receive goods and services from U.S.based operations.

Strickland says they also point clients to sources of legal, transportation and logistics information such as government agencies.

“The main things we’re helping companies to do to grow their international sales are to help manage risk and provide financing or working capital,” Strickland says.

Risks can include uncertainty about payment, currency exchange issues, an extended sales cycle and whether the customer actually receives the items.

“When you think about selling internationally, goods are on the ocean for a longer period of time,” says Ford.

“The export component is just different” in that way, Strickland says.

“You’ve got a container of goods that’s on the water potentially 45 to 60 days,” Strickland explains. “Compare that to a company sitting in Huntsville that’s got a customer in Atlanta. That’s a same-day delivery in most cases. All of that creates specialized financing solutions for that company.”

The biggest surprise for anyone not well versed in America’s import/export market, Strickland says, might be that “we import more than we export.”

Even with imported goods, “there’s a very high likelihood that something in that product actually came from the U.S. October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 17

originally” — like the Alabama cotton shirt example.

When American businesses sell something internationally, “to put it as simply as I can think of,” Strickland says, “you’re getting somebody else’s money, so you’re injecting that back into the U.S. economy rather than just relying on what’s going on domestically to drive economic growth.”

Another export benefit is more humanitarian in nature.

“Countries that trade with each other tend not to fight with each other as much,” he says. “You’re relying on the flow of goods, the flow of capital between countries. It might not appear that way, but they tend to get along better than if they were not doing that.”

Regions Bank has been an EXIM Delegated Authority Lender since 1994 and an EXIM (the nation’s export credit agency) Letter of Credit policyholder since 1991.

In February 2020, EXIM’s Board of Directors unanimously approved an increase in the delegated authority for Regions, allowing the bank to increase support for exports of U.S. goods and services from small and medium-sized companies in the states in which it operates.

The bank’s first export recognition came in 1968 when the Merchants National Bank of Mobile, a predecessor bank to Regions, received the President’s “E” Award for Export Service.

Regions has been recognized by other government agencies for its work to support exports. The U.S. Small Business Administration recognized Regions in 2019 and 2023 as its Export Lender of the Year.

EXIM named Regions Bank Lender of the Year in 2020 and awarded Deal of the Year Recognition in 2022.

Regions Financial Corp., with $155 billion in assets, is a member of the S&P 500 Index.

Regions serves customers across the South, Midwest and Texas, and through its subsidiary, Regions Bank, which operates approximately 1,250 banking offices and more than 2,000 ATMs. Deborah Storey and Mike Kittrell are freelance contributors to Business Alabama. She is based in Huntsville and he in Mobile.

18 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

BANKING & FINANCE

Alabama Bank Performances

Compiled by MEGAN BOYLE

NONCURRENT LOANS & LEASES 2024

NONCURRENT LOANS & LEASES 2023

% CHANGE 3/23-3/24

NONCURRENT LOANS TO LOANS

NONCURRENT LOANS AND LEASES TO TOTAL ASSETS

RETURN ON ASSETS

CORE CAP RATIO

1

Regions Bank regions.com

Birmingham 153,946,000 153,125,000 0.54% 95,635,000 97,129,000 -1.54% 1,100,000

713,000

54.28%

1.13%

0.71%

22,400,000 1.07%

9.41%

2

ServisFirst Bank servisfirstbank.com

Birmingham 15,720,721

14,565,304

7.93% 11,732,396 11,482,488 2.18%

34,837

17,951

94.07%

0.29%

0.22%

209,638

1.27%

9.80%

3

River Bank & Trust riverbankandtrust.com

Prattville

3,368,922

2,988,763

12.72% 2,244,545

1,890,240 18.74%

4,425

4,714

-6.13%

0.19%

0.13%

28,212

0.76%

8.53%

4

Bank Independent bibank.com

Sheffield

2,715,185

2,482,903

9.36%

1,787,576

1,689,786

5.79%

8,800

8,463

3.98%

0.49%

0.32%

25,406

0.81%

9.20%

5

CB&S Bank Inc. cbsbank.com

Russellville

2,645,695

2,487,639

6.35%

1,188,502

1,172,791

1.34%

20,206

12,296

64.33%

1.68%

0.76%

5,947

0.74%

10.72%

6

Southern States Bank southernstatesbank.net

Anniston

2,512,175

2,137,421

17.53% 1,940,430

1,627,836 19.20%

3,446

1,648

109.10%

0.18%

0.14%

36,504

1.51%

11.67%

7

Bryant Bank bryantbank.com

Tuscaloosa

2,459,926

2,374,879

3.58%

1,220,897

1,109,917 10.00%

1,338

8,323

-83.92%

0.11%

0.05%

47,668

2.00%

9.83%

8

SouthPoint Bank southpoint.bank

Birmingham

1,693,122

1,433,526

18.11% 1,540,706

1,183,253 30.21%

14,020

6,048

131.81%

0.90%

0.83%

17,261

1.13%

8.19%

9

Oakworth Capital Bank oakworth.com

Birmingham

1,598,899

1,326,387

20.55% 1,265,080

1,063,724 18.93%

5,372

0

n/a

0.42%

0.34%

6,532

1.11%

9.39%

10

Troy Bank & Trust Co. troybankandtrust.com

Troy

1,514,834

1,448,218

4.60%

951,358

900,043

5.70%

5,446

3,506

55.33%

0.56%

0.36%

11,594

0.83%

10.65%

11

Peoples Bank of Alabama peoplesbankal.com

Cullman

1,310,967

1,265,117

3.62%

858,686

800,638

7.25%

1,340

535

150.47%

0.15%

0.10%

25,633

1.76%

10.44%

12

United Bank unitedbank.com

Atmore

1,189,371

1,114,607

6.71%

759,084

687,547

10.40%

998

6,525

-84.70%

0.13%

0.08%

25,563

1.90%

12.88%

13

Citizens Bank & Trust citizensbanktrust.com

Guntersville

1,104,751

1,019,465

8.37%

585,926

529,371

10.68%

1,779

1,799

-1.11%

0.30%

0.16%

6,183

0.66%

9.14%

14

First US Bank firstusbank.com

Birmingham

1,070,407

1,026,551

4.27%

812,505

764,290

6.31%

2,393

1,214

97.12%

0.29%

0.22%

9,847

1.19%

9.37%

15

Metro Bank metrobankpc.com

Pell City

1,052,660

1,013,056

3.91%

509,823

461,116

10.56%

2,005

536

274.07%

0.39%

0.19%

16,676

1.40%

14.99%

16

First Bank of Alabama fbal.bank

Talladega

1,026,420

961,522

6.75%

684,475

642,203

6.58%

6,105

2,356

159.13%

0.88%

0.59%

13,739

1.26%

9.89%

17

First Metro Bank firstmetro.com

Muscle Shoals

1,004,090

899,078

11.68%

548,222

505,336

8.49%

298

313

-4.79%

0.05%

0.03%

14,018

1.48%

11.14%

18

AuburnBank auburnbank.com

Auburn

979,011

1,017,190

-3.75%

560,481

498,220

12.50%

879

2,680

-67.20%

0.15%

0.09%

1,597

0.58%

10.34%

19

West Alabama Bank & Trust wabt.com

Reform

906,001

845,055

7.21%

16,175

469,048

-96.55%

4,988

886

462.98%

0.93%

0.55%

8,006

0.99%

10.64%

20

First Southern State Bank fssbank.com

Stevenson

788,429

764,304

3.16%

444,553

424,011

4.84%

374

80

367.50%

0.08%

0.05%

9,008

1.03%

9.79%

21

Traditions Bank traditionsal.com

Cullman

759,844

680,326

11.69%

606,464

529,153

14.61%

2,544

2,039

24.77%

0.41%

0.33%

10,640

1.62%

9.36%

22

CCB Community Bank bankccb.com

Andalusia

646,392

617,148

4.74%

482,390

452,466

6.61%

14

933

-98.50%

0.00%

0.00%

11,440

1.81%

10.06%

23

MidSouth Bank bankmidsouth.com

Dothan

642,893

577,543

11.32%

367,369

285,932

28.48%

237

111

113.51%

0.06%

0.04%

5,442

0.84%

9.46%

24

The Hometown Bank of Alabama hometownbankofalabama.com

Oneonta

631,348

553,504

14.06%

346,803

299,779

15.69%

3,574

2,748

30.06%

1.02%

0.57%

7,395

0.94%

10.25%

25

CommerceOne Bank commerceonebank.com

Birmingham

618,457

597,109

3.58%

503,034

502,686

0.07%

3,109

0

n/a

0.61%

0.50%

7,562

1.59%

11.03%

26

First Southern Bank firstsouthern.com

Florence

613,010

554,384

10.57%

521,740

469,686

11.08%

1,100

992

10.89%

0.21%

0.18%

7,507

1.29%

9.90%

27

First Community Bank of Central Alabama fcbca.com

Wetumpka

612,264

568,949

7.61%

357,252

326,873

9.29%

1,033

952

8.51%

0.28%

0.17%

12,468

2.15%

8.61%

28

Central State Bank centralstatebank.com

Calera

609,124

556,857

9.39%

385286

350,577

-99.93%

230

1

22900.00% 0.06%

0.04%

10,630

1.60%

10.37%

29

Robertson Banking Co. robertsonbanking.com

Demopolis

467,756

455,079

2.79%

309,849

289,214

7.13%

1,325

1,681

-21.18%

0.28%

7,106

1.85%

9.66%

LOCATION

TOTAL ASSETS 2024

TOTAL ASSETS 2023

NET LOANS NET LOANS & LEASES & LEASES 2024 2023

% CHANGE 3/23-3/24

COMPANY / WEBSITE

% CHANGE 3/23-3/24

RANK

Dollar amounts in thousands. Data for total assets, net loans and leases, and noncurrent loans and leases reflects first quarter end 2023 and first quarter end 2024. Data for net income reflects year end 2023.

0.42%

NET INCOME

(1) LifeSteps Bank & Trust was formerly known as Community Bank and Trust - Alabama prior to change in management.

(2) Nova Bank was registered with the FDIC on January 26, 2024. Data for fiscal year 2023 not available.

(3) The following banks included in the 2023 ranking do not appear in the 2024 ranking: • The acquisition of First Bank by Tuscaloosa-based Alabama ONE Credit Union is anticipated to close by the end of 2024.

• SunSouth Bank was acquired by Daleville-based All In Credit Union in 2023.

Source: Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.

For more banks, visit BusinessAlabama.com.

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 19

BANKING & FINANCE

ACQUISITIONS FUEL WAVERLY ADVISORS GROWTH Warren Averett spinoff now ranks as second-largest advisory firm in Alabama

By GAIL ALLYN SHORT

O

ne could say Waverly Advisors LLC, a fee-only, registered investment adviser (RIA) based in Birmingham, is undergoing a growth spurt.

An inorganic growth spurt that is. The company is rapidly expanding its business

through an aggressive acquisition strategy.

This year Waverly Advisors wrapped up its 16th acquisition of financial and wealth management firms in less than four years. In fact, Financial Advisor Magazine’s RIA Survey and Ranking for 2024 listed Waverly Advisors at No. 16 on its Top 50 Fastest Growing Firms list.

“Growing organically is still a high

“

priority for us,” says Waverly Advisor’s President Justin Russell. “Healthy things grow, in our mind. We added the inorganic component, but we’re certainly still committed to growing organically as well.”

Just this year alone, Waverly Advisors snapped up several of what are now partner firms: StrategiQ Financial Group

when you have these various financial advisory firms, there’s going to be diversities across them. They’re each going to have different client bases.

They’re each going to have different focuses, and those diversities, when you roll them all up into one larger pool, you can make a larger organization that can serve a broader range of clients in different demographic communities.”

20 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

— Professor Patrick Murphy, Ph.D., Goodrich Endowed Chair for Innovation and Entrepreneurship at the UAB Collat School of Business

BANKING & FINANCE

in Merrillville, Indiana; EFP Advisors in Jackson, Mississippi; McShane Partners in Charlotte, North Carolina; Derbend Asset Management in Peachtree City, Georgia; and River Capital Advisors L.C. based in Jacksonville, Florida.

The River Capital acquisition brought Waverly Advisor’s assets under management (AUM) — the market value of assets managed on behalf of clients — to $12.5 billion as of July 19.

Led by CEO Josh Reidinger, Waverly Advisors serves high-net-worth individuals and families as well as corporate retirement plans, institutions, endowments and trusts.

And as of last year, Waverly Advisors is the second-largest financial planning and investment advisory firm in Alabama, just behind Captrust of Birmingham. Waverly operates 21 offices in nine states across the United States and employs more than 170 professionals.

Russell says Waverly’s commitment to growth through acquisitions is driven by three pillars of thought within the company.

“The first pillar was, how do we offer more depth of expertise to clients?” says Russell. “When you become a bigger organization, you’re able to start investing in talent that specializes in certain things, whether it be Social Security and Medicare planning and estate planning, or different investment structures.”

The second point was to create outsized opportunities for people within the organization to take leadership roles on the integration team and work with the partner firms.

“The third, and most important to us, is: How do we maintain or strengthen the culture that we’ve worked so hard to build?

“So, anytime we’re having a conversation with a potential partner firm, we lead with culture 100% of the time, and we’re not trying to change people to our culture. We’re trying to find someone on the front end that matches 90% with our culture already, and can jump in and hit the ground running,” Russell says.

Russell says Waverly Advisors is particularly attracted to CPA-oriented firms and those that have a legacy in a CPA firm.

“

So, anytime we’re having a conversation with a potential partner firm, we lead with culture 100% of the time, and we’re not trying to change people to our culture. We’re trying to find someone on the front end that matches 90% with our culture already, and can jump in and hit the ground running.”

— Justin Russell, President “We think we’re uniquely positioned to understand the challenges and the benefits of those relationships, so, we think we make a good partner there,” says Russell.

“And we started looking in the Southeast because of cultural alignment, but we’ve found that the story resonates nationwide. So, we’re certainly not limiting ourselves to those geographies,” he says.

Waverly Advisors is the former Warren

Averett Asset Management.

But after splitting from its parent company, Warren Averett CPAs & Advisors, WAAM in 2021 announced a new agreement with Wealth Partners Capital Group, an RIA investor, and HGGC, a private equity firm, to fund WAAM’s growth, both organic and through mergers and acquisitions. WAAM said Warren Averett CPAs & Advisors would maintain a minority stake in WAAM. “The thinking was, we wanted to maintain strong ties with the CPA firm, which we have. We still serve a lot of joint clients, but we wanted to add a component, inorganic growth, meaning mergers and acquisitions, to our business, and we needed a capital partner to help us do that,” Russell says.

“So, we were able to keep the best things about the accounting firm, the relationship and the referral network that we had, while taking on a great capital partner and wealth partners, Capital Group and HGGC. That helped us pour gasoline on the fire to keep growing the company and creating opportunities for people within the company,” he says.

Then in 2022, WAAM rebranded itself as Waverly Advisors.

Professor Patrick Murphy, Ph.D., the Goodrich Endowed Chair for Innovation and Entrepreneurship at the UAB Collat School of Business, says several factors in the market can make acquisitions an attractive business strategy.

One is declining interest rates. But even the anticipation of lower interest rates can make borrowing and fundraising cheaper, and therefore, the cost of financing and acquisitions cheaper as well, he says.

“Second, when you have these various financial advisory firms, there’s going to be diversities across them. They’re each going to have different client bases.

They’re each going to have different focuses, and those diversities, when you roll them all up into one larger pool, you can make a larger organization that can serve a broader range of clients in different demographic communities,” Murphy says.

Russell says the reasons why smaller financial advisers agree to sell varies.

“Number one, there’s a lot of baby October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 21

BANKING & FINANCE

boomers that built these businesses and are looking for a great succession plan to take care of their people and their clients, and we serve that role,” Russell says.

“And then number two, you’ve got more growth-oriented advisers that maybe are in their mid-40s, and they’ve got a lot of career ahead of them and are looking for more resources to have at their disposal to serve their clients better and get more clients,” he says.

“We’ve got our IT team that’s inhouse,” he says. “We’ve got in-house human resources and recruiting that helps staff these firms and centralized marketing — where small businesses that have four or five people can’t invest in that kind of infrastructure.”

But some factors could make a firm a poor fit for acquisition, Russell says.

“We’re a fee-only fiduciary in this space. Someone who has a substantial amount of commission business or brokerage business, not saying that’s better,

“

22 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

Oftentimes when things are bad in the market, that’s when you should be making moves to get more aggressive, and when things are seemingly good, you should be making moves to get more conservative. It can be counterintuitive, so, finding someone that you trust, who can strip the emotion out of it and make decisions that are best for you and your family, is paramount.”

— Justin Russell, President worse or indifferent, just that it doesn’t fit very well in our system,” he says.

Russell says that meanwhile, Waverly Advisors plans to continue on its acquisition path with more coming later this

year.

“What’s next is we’re continuing on the path of acquisitions. I’m having the time of my life professionally, It’s rewarding to see what we’re building and the opportunities that we’re creating,” he says.

And while Waverly offers its clients financial advice and counsel, Russell says he has one piece of advice for everyone: “Find an adviser that you really trust and take their advice.”

“Oftentimes when things are bad in the market, that’s when you should be making moves to get more aggressive, and when things are seemingly good, you should be making moves to get more conservative. It can be counterintuitive, so, finding someone that you trust, who can strip the emotion out of it and make decisions that are best for you and your family, is paramount.”

Gail Allyn Short is a Birmingham-based freelance contributor to Business Alabama.

INNOVATION

TO THE

MOON

Corky Clinton is principal investigator, and Jennifer Edmunson (not pictured) is project manager for the MMPACT program based at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville. Photo by David Higginbotham.

W

hen people go to the moon to either live or work — which NASA’s Artemis flight program is revising from pipe dream to real prospect — they’ll need infrastructure.

Travelers — and residents — will need landing pads to land on, roads to travel on, buildings to work in, hotels and houses to stay in.

Just how to provide those necessities on the moon is the major question that Marshall Space Flight Center’s MMPACT (Moon to Mars Planetary Autonomous Construction Technologies) project is

Through its MMPACT program based in Huntsville, NASA wants to learn how to build habitats in space

By ALEC HARVEY

trying to answer.

Among other things, they’re looking at how regolith — the layer of dust, pebbles and rocks that covers the moon’s surface — can be used for construction via a large 3D printer with a robotic arm.

For many, it’s the stuff of sciencefiction movies, but for the folks working on MMPACT, it’s a necessity for humanity’s growth in other realms, locations where you can’t just move cranes and other construction equipment to get the job done. And what MMPACT does can lead to thriving communities on the moon and beyond.

“We do get down deep into technical discussions, and then it’s work,” says Corky Clinton, principal investigator and senior advisor, Marshall Space Flight Center Science and Technology Office. “But then you take a step back, and you can’t not get excited about wanting to build humanity’s first home on another planet.”

National exposure Others are excited by it, too. MMPACT was featured on CBS’ “60 Minutes,” which focused on NASA’s work with Icon, a October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 27

I N N OVAT I O N

Earlier this year, Icon tested a mock-up of a robotic arm in the V-20 testing chamber at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville.

Photo courtesy of NASA.

Texas construction company that uses 3D printing robotics to construct houses and other structures.

Icon and its co-founder and CEO, Jason Ballard, came onto Clinton’s radar when the company took part in NASA’s 2019 Centennial Challenge to build a 3D-printed habitat for deep space exploration. Though Icon advanced in the competition, it couldn’t compete in the finals because of a business commitment.

Later, Ballard brought his son to Space Camp at Marshall and, while there, briefed Clinton and others on Icon’s technology. “We saw immediately that they had made significant advances in the technologies,” says Clinton, who leads the 28 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

MMPACT team along with project manager and geologist Jennifer Edmunson.

In its work with MMPACT, Icon is developing a space-based construction system that takes the moon’s regolith (simulated regolith at this point, based on samples brought back to Earth by Apollo astronauts), uses a laser to melt it and form it, and dispenses it in layers with a robotic arm to build structures.

Earlier this year, Icon’s mockup of a terrestrial robot arm was tested in Marshall’s V-20 testing chamber, which provides a simulated lunar environment with its vacuum and its extreme hot and cold temperatures. NASA and Icon are analyzing the results to determine next steps.

“We will finish the technology maturation phase of this project by the end of January 2025, and then we’re looking forward to taking this into a flight demonstration phase that would allow us to demonstrate the technology in a lunar mission,” Clinton says.

NASA’s partners Icon is just one of a number of entities NASA is partnering with on the MMPACT project. Among the partners are: • Kratos SRE, based in Birmingham, which is developing a tool that will test regolith on the surface of the moon.

I N N OVAT I O N

work on the MMPACT project is largescale printing, so we were able to procure a large-scale 3D concrete printer here on campus to print test structures. … The focus of that work is to print concrete structures and test them in different situations that are as close as possible to those that you would find on the moon.”

Sims says the program, which started at Drake State in 2020, has touched about 600 students and teachers. “We’re able to bring teachers on campus during the summer and show them this work, because it’s important that they understand the advances in technology. If you’re in the classroom, a lot of times you don’t get to see that first-hand.”

Artemis continues MMPACT is separate from NASA’s Artemis project, a series of launches designed to get humans back on the moon and, eventually, to Mars. Artemis

I, an uncrewed test flight around the moon, has already occurred. Artemis II, now scheduled for late 2025, will be a crewed flight around the moon. Artemis III will be a crewed lunar landing mission, and other missions will go to the planned Lunar Gateway, a new lunar space station.

“The agency is looking at a deployable habitat … which is probably where the astronauts will go to stay for short periods of time in the early Artemis missions,” Clinton says, adding that what MMPACT is creating will be for the long-term. “We talk about having a sustained human presence and a robust lunar economy.”

And Mars? That’s in Clinton’s sights, too.

“The technologies that we’re looking at today are definitely transferable to Mars,” he says. “The Mars environment is much more hospitable, relatively speaking, than the lunar environment.”

• Blue Origin, Jeff Bezos’ aerospace company with a facility in Huntsville, helping to create lunar landing pad requirements.

• Astroport Space Technologies, a Texas company studying how molten regolith can be made into tiles.

• The Colorado School of Mines, which is providing the regolith simulant.

And there are others, including Drake State Community & Technical College, a Huntsville institution that developed an additive construction curriculum.

“Our role has been to create the workforce to support a trained workforce pool to support NASA,” says Dr. Patricia Sims, the school’s president. “A lot of the October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 29

The new frontier But first things first.

The initial mark of success for MMPACT will be a proof-of-concept demonstration of construction on the moon, says Edmunson. “This demonstration would encompass fabricating a few test pieces and a representative element of a future landing pad,” she says.

That demonstration would be followed by a lunar mission to build a functional landing pad for cargo and human landers and then another lunar mission that demonstrates building a habitat.

“I would expect our industry partners to take it from there, building things like roads, radio telescopes, laboratory and mining facilities and resort hotels on the lunar surface,” Edmunson says.

Key to all of this is getting humans on the moon again rather than relying on unmanned rovers and other equipment, she adds.

“It’s important that humans complete the sortie missions because they are particularly adept at noticing small changes in the surrounding geology,” Edmunson says. “Humans can also make decisions ‘on the fly’ to investigate different areas or select different samples.”

Edmunson is focused on the future while acknowledging the importance of the past.

“The Apollo program did a great job giving us a foundational understanding of the moon, but there is so much left to explore and so much more to learn,” she says.

All of this won’t be easy, Edmunson says, but it’s certainly possible.

“Humans are creative, resilient creatures in general,” she says. “They live in the most remote and extreme environments on Earth and in Low Earth Orbit.

They operate differently based on their environmental conditions, and they adapt to changes in those conditions.”

“The moon is the new frontier,” she continues. “It’s humanity’s next greatest challenge.”

Alec Harvey is executive editor of Business Alabama, working from the Birmingham office.

David Higginbotham is a Decatur-based freelance contributor.

30 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

AV I AT I O N & A E RO S PAC E

HELPING ALABAMA TAKE FLIGHT The Alabama Department of Commerce uses international air shows to showcase Alabama industry

By STEVEN CASTLE

I

f the term “air show” conjures up jets in tight formation performing death-defying stunts, think again. For the world’s economic development experts, it means a place to make the connections that keep the aviation and aerospace industries humming across the globe.

And that means Alabama — with a swath of aerospace across the northern tier and a healthy band of commercial aviation across the coast and a mix throughout the rest of the state — turned out in force for the 2024 Farnborough International Air Show near London.

The Alabama Department of Commerce — the chief economic development agency for the state — led a team of

The Huntsville-Madison County Delegation was greeted by Sen. Katie Boyd Britt as she stopped by the State of Alabama booth at the Farnborough Air Show in London, U.K. From left to right: Dr. Chuck Karr, president, University of Alabama in Huntsville; LaFreeda Jordan, University of Alabama in Huntsville and board member, Huntsville International Airport; Mike Ward, SVP, Government and Public Affairs, Huntsville/Madison County Chamber; Dr. Carl Gessler, board member, Huntsville International Airport; Sen. Katie Boyd Britt; Chip Cherry, president and CEO, Huntsville/Madison County Chamber; Barbie Peek, chief business development officer, Huntsville International Airport; Butch Roberts, CEO, Huntsville International Airport; Sameer Singhal, board chair, Huntsville/Madison County Chamber and president/CEO, CFD Research; Penny Townson, field consultant, TVA. Huntsville Mayor Tommy Battle (not pictured) also attended the air show.

Photo courtesy of Mary Swanstrom, Port of Huntsville.

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 31

AV I AT I O N & A E RO S PAC E

state officials and private business leaders to the conference, one of the two largest and most important in the world, with 100,000 visitors and 1,500 exhibitors from 60 countries.

Beyond showing off the state at Farnborough and the similar Paris Air Show in alternate years, Commerce also helps facilitate the meetings that can lead to big and small deals for the state’s businesses.

Those meetings are the ultimate goal of attending these shows, according to Alabama Department of Commerce Deputy Secretary Angela Till. “[We] have been participating in the air shows at Farnborough and Paris for a long time, and we keep coming back because these shows provide a great return on investment,” she says. “To get the results that we achieved at Farnborough this year, we would have had to jet all over the world in hopes of getting meetings with top companies. It’s just a very efficient, cost-effective opportunity for us.”

That’s because Farnborough, and its unofficial sister show, the Paris Air Show, are unique for their appeal to the top executives in the industry. “Just about 32 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

Mobile — where Airbus builds commercial jets in the A320 and A220 families (like this one in progress) — is among the world’s largest aircraft producing cities.

Deals to bring supplier firms often grow from connections made at international air shows. Photo courtesy of Airbus.

every aerospace and aviation company in the world is at these two shows, and they bring most of their C-Suite with them,” explains Bob Smith, assistant director of business development for the Alabama Department of Commerce. “If you walk up to the show, you’d think you were walking up to Bryant-Denny Stadium on a Saturday for a football game; there’s just that many people walking in every direction, getting where they need to be.”

This year, Alabama’s delegation included several top private business executives, Department of Commerce officials, Alabama Lt. Gov. Will Ainsworth and U.S. Sen. Katie Britt.

“I was honored to help be a part of the team showcasing Alabama as a Sweet Home to do business,” Britt told Business Alabama. “The Air Show is a great annual opportunity to encourage international

companies to invest in our state and create good-paying, 21st-century Alabama jobs.”

The route to those jobs is relatively straightforward.

“Our goals when supporting Alabama companies at this and any trade show are to support them in generating sales and reaching new customers. Those sales lead to more production back home, which leads to quality jobs,” explains Till. “One thing we’re able to do at these international air shows is project a positive impression about Alabama… Our ‘Made in Alabama’ exhibition booth transmits the message to the world that Alabama is sophisticated and plugged into the future of the aerospace industry. Many meetings are held at the booth, so it’s valuable for us to project that image.”

Britt concurs. “I always enjoy sharing our story with companies who are thinking about opening or expanding facilities in Alabama. We never let them down; that’s a fact.”

But shows like Farnborough aren’t just valuable opportunities to connect Alabama industry with potential clients.

They’re also useful media platforms.

AV I AT I O N & A E RO S PAC E

GE Aviation uses additive manufacturing techniques to craft jet fuel nozzles in its plant in Auburn — a $50 million plant that state Commerce officials highlight as among the most significant announcements to come from connections made at an international air show. Photo courtesy of GE Aviation.

“[These shows] give us a world stage…

All of the aerospace journals and industry publications are there. There’s a newsroom and everything,” Smith says. “If you have an announcement, everybody everywhere has an opportunity to see that — hey, here’s somebody going to Alabama.”

One of the most significant Alabama projects to be announced at an international air show came in 2014 from GE Aerospace. “The GE Aerospace project [introduced] mass production of a jet engine fuel nozzle using additive manufacturing technology in Auburn,” says Till. “This Alabama plant became the first in the industry to launch high-volume 3-D printing of a jet engine part, and that elevated our aerospace sector to another level.” That Auburn-based manufacturing plant represented a $50 million investment from GE in Alabama, and it has paid dividends in the years since: in 2021, GE celebrated shipping its 100,000th fuel nozzle from the Auburn plant that still employs several hundred people.

And the successes of these shows are not slowing. At the 2024 Farnborough show, the Alabama Department

of Commerce engaged in 18 scheduled appointments with industry leaders. “We identified seven new growth projects from companies interested in Alabama,” says Till, “along with 10 other solid prospects whose growth plans could eventually include the state.”

And those prospects can render results quickly.

“We had never made a large airplane in this state until 2016,” says Smith, “and now we’re about fourth in the world in large airplane production behind Seattle, Hamburg and Toulouse. That’s pretty big.”

As Alabama’s “pretty big” aviation and

aerospace industry continues flourishing, the Alabama Department of Commerce remains steadfast in fostering it.

And the message they bring, to all who will hear it, is summed up by Britt: “There truly is no better place to do business or work than Alabama, where our policies support growth and innovation and stakeholders are surrounded by some of the strongest brainpower in the aerospace, defense and intelligence sectors,” she says. “Alabama is open for business.”

Steven Castle is a Mobile-based freelance contributor to Business Alabama.

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 33

AV I AT I O N & A E RO S PAC E

Alabama Aerospace & Aviation Companies Aerospace- and aviation-oriented companies in Alabama.

Compiled by MEGAN BOYLE

NUMBER OF EMPLOYEES

1117 Dilly Branch Rd. Fort Rucker, AL 36362

334-598-0433 m1services.com

3,800

Boeing Co.

499 Boeing Blvd. SW Huntsville, AL 35824

256-461-2121 boeing.com

3,411

3

Dynetics Inc.

1002 Explorer Blvd. NW Huntsville, AL 35806

256-964-4000 dynetics.com

2,946

4

Science Applications International Corp. (SAIC)

6725 Odyssey Dr. Huntsville, AL 35806

256-971-6411 SAIC.com

2,746

5

Northrop Grumman Corp.

301 Voyager Way Huntsville, AL 35806

256-837-2400 northropgrumman.com

2,266

6

Airbus Americas Inc.

320 Airbus Way Mobile, AL 36615

251-439-4100 us.airbus.com

2,200

7

Lockheed Martin

4800 Bradford Dr. NW Huntsville, AL 35805

256-722-4000 lockheedmartin.com

1,685

8

Collins Aerospace

351 Airport Dr. Foley, AL 36535

619-403-7326 collinsaerospace.com

1,100

9

VT Mobile Aerospace Engineering Inc.

2100 Aerospace Dr. Mobile, AL 36615

251-438-8888 vtmae.com

1,060

10

Hexagon US Federal

301 Cochran Rd. SW Huntsville, AL 35824

256-799-6300 hexagonusfederal.com

1,059

11

Science & Engineering Services

248 Dunlop Blvd. SW Huntsville, AL 35824

256-258-0500 sesi-md.com

1,050

Aviation integration.

12

Raytheon Co.

401 Jan Davis Dr. NW Huntsville, AL 35806

256-542-4600 rtx.com

945

Navigational, measuring, electromedical and control instruments manufacturing; additional Alabama operations in Auburn, Eastaboga, Hazel Green and Fort Rucker.

13

Yulista Aviation Inc.

8600 Advanced Gateway SW Huntsville, AL 35808

256-713-1360 yulista.com

923

Aerospace products and parts manufacturing; additional Alabama operations in Madison and Meridianville.

14

GKN Westland Aerospace Inc.

3951 Alabama Hwy. 229 S. Tallassee, AL 36078

334-283-9200 gkn.com

920

Manufacturer of composite structures and assemblies for helicopters, fixed wing aircraft and engine components.

15

Axient

360A Quality Cir., Ste. 100 Huntsville, AL 35806

256-650-6263 axientcorp.com

900

16

Teledyne Brown Engineering

300 Sparkman Dr. NW Huntsville, AL 35805

256-726-1000 tbe.com

794

17

PPG Aerospace

10326 Saint Alban Blvd. SW Huntsville, AL 35803

256-513-8498 ppgaerospace.com

750

18

United Launch Alliance

3401 AL-20 Decatur, AL 35601

256-432-1000 ulalaunch.com

742

19

Sanmina Corp.

13000 Memorial Pkwy. SW Huntsville, AL 35803

256-882-4543 sanmina.com

726

20

ERC Inc.

308 Voyager Way, Ste. 200 Huntsville, AL 35806

256-430-3080 erc-incorporated.com

694

Engineering and scientific services firm providing independent assessment support, IT support and operations and maintenance support to NASA, defense and commercial clients.

21

General Dynamics Corp.

310 The Bridge St. Huntsville, AL 35806

256-799-3665 gdit.com

589

Computer systems design ; engineering, scientific research; airspace products and parts. Additional operations in Anniston, Cullman, Daleville, Fort Rucker, Mobile, Montgomery and Valley.

22

Jacobs Space Exploration Group

620 Discovery Dr. NW, Bldg. 2 Ste. 140, Huntsville, AL 35806

256-971-5500 jseg.space

586

23

Lockheed Martin

5500 County Rd. 37 Troy, AL 36081

334-670-9500 lockheedmartin.com

557

24

Benchmark Electronics Huntsville Inc.

4807 Bradford Dr. NW Huntsville, AL 35805

256-722-6000 bench.com

538

25

AAR Manufacturing Inc.

140 Sparkman Dr. NW Huntsville, AL 35805

256-830-7000 aarcorp.com

500

26

Continental Aerospace Technologies

2039 S. Broad St. Mobile, AL 36615

800-718-3411 continental.aero

450

27

Delta Air Line Inc.

1710 40th St N. Air Cargo Rd. Ste. B, Birmingham, AL 35212

404-715-4846 delta.com

400

28

Prince Metal Stamping USA Inc.

1108 Airport Industrial Dr. Gadsden, AL 35904

256-413-0587 narmco.com

385

29

Sikorsky Helicopter

299 Airport Blvd.

Troy, AL 36079

334-807-8200 lockheedmartin.com

367

30

Commercial Jet

171 Pemco Dr. Midland City, AL 36350

334-873-4450 commercialjet.com

350

31

AI Signal Research Inc.

2001 Nichols Dr., Ste. 300 Huntsville, AL 35802

256-551-0008 aisignal.com

340

32

Arctic Slope World Services Inc.

760 Hwy. 134 E. Daleville, AL 36322

334-598-1822 arcticworld.com

309

33

Honeywell Aerospace

1 Cliff Garrett Dr. Anniston, AL 36203

256-835-4100 aerospace.honeywell.com

300

RANK

PHONE / WEBSITE

COMPANY

ADDRESS

1

M1 Support Services

2

Source: Dun & Bradstreet, Business Source Complete and local economic developers

34 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

BUSINESS DESCRIPTION Aircraft maintenance.

Support for commercial airplanes, services, space and defense work including missile defense, space exploration, systems engineering, integration, design and fabrication; additional Alabama operations in Anniston, Daleville, Danville, Eva, Hazel Green and Pinson.

Aerospace/defense; additional operations in Hazel Green.

Engineering and ERD PE support services in telecommunications, missile, space, aviation, hardware and software services, program management and software development.

Aerospace/defense; additional operations in Madison, Mobile and Montgomery.

Aircraft manufacturing; research and development.

Research and development, engineering, weapons, systems development; additional operations in Anniston, Courtland, Fort Rucker, Madison, Mobile, Montgomery and Troy.

Aircraft nacelle manufacturing & MRO. Maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) facility providing aircraft maintenance and modification services for both commercial airlines and air freight operators. Business unit of the aerospace division of VT Systems.

Software development.

Research and development.

Aerospace/defense.

Aviation, transparencies for airplanes.

Evolved expandable launch vehicles.

Semiconductors and other electronic components; additional Alabama operations in Guntersville.

Research and development.

Aerospace.

Electronic components, electromechanic assembly and systems integration.

Manufacturing complete guided missiles and space vehicles.

Aircraft engines and parts.

Air transportation.

Forging and stamping.

Helicopter manufacturer.

Aircraft maintenance.

Engineering services, facilities support services, commercial physical research.

Manufacture, assembly and repair of aircraft.

Repair and overhaul of commercial airline components.

For more companies, see businessalabama.com.

S PECIAL

S EC TIO N

THANK YOU TO OUR SPONSORS

SILVER SPONSORS

BRONZE SPONSORS

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 35

RISING STARS

SPECIAL SECTION

RISING STARS OF BANKING 2024 Here’s a look at 22 on-the-rise bankers selected from around the state

finance with a specialization in banking and financial services.

At Alabama, he was vice president and head of recruitment for his fraternity, Pi Kappa Phi.

children and live in Huntsville, where Allen enjoys playing golf, attending concerts and volunteering with his children’s

CHRIS ALLEN

sports teams.

He began working at Regions when he graduated, and he loves working with customers to help make their ideal financial picture more attainable.

Outside of work, Anderson enjoys spending time with family and friends and watching

CHRIS ALLEN is Huntsville

Alabama football.

market president at Southern States Bank. A graduate of Athens State University, he began his banking career as a teller and has had banking roles at Synovus, BBVA and Regions Bank. Allen serves on the Huntsville Hospital Foundation Development Council and is past president for

DALTON ANDERSON

Friends Inc. Allen is a member

DALTON ANDERSON is an as-

of the Committee of 100, the

sistant branch manager/team

Huntsville Rotary Club and the

lead for Regions Bank at the

Huntsville Hardwood Club, a

Bradford Creek branch in Mad-

nonprofit aimed at growing

ison. A Huntsville native, he

basketball in the community.

graduated from the University

He and his wife have three

of Alabama with a degree in

36 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

EASON BALCH

EASON BALCH is a first vice president of commercial banking for Valley National Bank in Birmingham. He began his

SPECIAL SECTION

RISING STARS

banking career in 2000 after

Professional designation from

campaign co-chair for the Unit-

earning a financial manage-

the Association for Financial

ed Way of Southwest Alabama.

ment degree from the Universi-

Professionals. Binion is on the

He is a graduate of Leadership

ty of Alabama at Birmingham.

boards of the Mobile Chamber

Mobile and the Alabama Lead-

Balch serves on the board of

of Commerce and the Friends

ership Initiative. He and his

Fellowship House Inc., vol-

of Magnolia Cemetery and is a

wife have two children.

unteers on the usher team at Church of the Highlands and volunteers as a youth coach for baseball and basketball.

He and his wife, Elizabeth, and three children live in Birmingham. Balch enjoys spending time with his family, attending college football games, traveling and playing golf.

BRUNER BINION

BRUNER BINION is the Regions Bank market executive and senior vice president, commercial banking leader for South Alabama. He joined Regions in 2008 after graduating from the University of Mississippi, working in commercial banking throughout his 16-year career.

He holds a Certified Treasury

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 37

RISING STARS

SPECIAL SECTION

KEN BROWN

JASON DAVIS

HAVEN DUFF

KEN BROWN is South Alabama

JASON DAVIS serves as the

HAVEN DUFF is a senior vice

market president for First Hori-

chief financial officer of River

president and corporate rela-

zon Bank. A Mobile native, he

Bank & Trust, the largest com-

tionship manager for Smart-

is a graduate of the University

munity bank headquartered

Bank in Auburn. She earned

of Alabama with more than

in Alabama. Before joining

her bachelor’s and master’s

25 years of banking experi-

the bank in 2017, he gained

degrees in finance from Au-

ence. Since joining what was

extensive experience during

burn University. She began her

then Iberiabank in 2011, Brown

his 15-year tenure at Jackson

banking career in 2007, serv-

has led efforts to grow the

Thornton, where he focused on

ing in various credit roles prior

retail, private banking, wealth

financial institution audits and

to becoming a commercial

management, business and

consulting. Davis, a certified

lender. Duff has recently been

commercial banking segments

public accountant, earned his

selected for the role of market

of the bank. He is a recipient

Bachelor of Science in Business

president for SmartBank Au-

of Mobile Bay magazine’s 40

Administration and a Master

burn. She serves on the board

Under 40 awards and served in

of Accountancy from Auburn

of The Boys and Girls Club of

Leadership Alabama. He was a

University. He also graduated

Greater Lee County and enjoys

founding member of the Young

from the Alabama Banking

volunteering with the Auburn

Leaders Society of United Way

School in 2014 as valedictorian.

Housing Authority. She and her

of Southwest Alabama and

Davis serves as the treasurer of

husband, Seth, reside in Au-

served on the board of direc-

Habitat for Humanity of Autau-

burn and have two daughters.

tors. Brown currently serves on

ga & Chilton Counties and as a

the governing board for Good-

board member of the Autauga

ALLEN DYE serves as first vice

will and Big Brothers Big Sis-

Education Foundation. He lives

president, commercial bank-

ters of South Alabama. Brown

in Prattville with his wife, Bri-

ing, for ServisFirst Bank in

and his wife have four children

anna, and their four children.

Birmingham. Dye began his de-

(two sets of twins).

cade-long tenure at ServisFirst in the residential mortgage de-

38 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024 2021

Congratulates this year’s Rising Stars of Banking SBA 504 Loan Program:

• Fixed-Asset Financing • Competitive and Fixed Interest Rate • Long Repayment Terms up to 25 years • For Existing or New/Start-up for-profit Companies

CONTACT US TODAY (334) 244-1801 www.sdcinc.org 200 Office Park Drive, Suite 338 Mountain Brook, AL 35223

We’ve been helping Alabama Bankers make loans since 1983 by: • helping you create more lending opportunities for your customer • sharing and mitigating risk for you • providing below-market rates fixed for the life of the loan • allowing your customer to provide only 10% down • providing your customer longer payment terms • being an Alabama Business that’s for Alabama Business

October October 2024 2021 BusinessAlabama.com | 39

RISING STARS

SPECIAL SECTION

ALLEN DYE

ANDREA FROST

ALLEN HAMILTON

partment and has since worked

Colonial Bank in the account-

from the University of West

within the commercial banking

ing department before getting

Alabama. Outside of work,

team. Dye graduated from the

a job at her hometown bank,

he enjoys playing golf and

University of Alabama, where

where she has now been for

spending time with family and

he obtained his bachelor’s and

more than 10 years. She is a

friends. Hamilton serves on the

master’s degrees and current-

2018 graduate of the Alabama

Industrial Development Board

ly serves as the University of

Banking School and also is a

for the city of Thomasville and

Alabama’s A-Club President, an

recent graduate of the Ala-

enjoys being involved in the

organization of former letter-

bama Banker Association’s Ex-

community, which he believes

winners. In his free time, Dye

ecutive Leadership Program. In

contributes to his well-rounded

enjoys being the head coach

addition to compliance, Frost

perspective and creativity in

for Full Count Ministries in

oversees the audit function

commercial lending.

Vestavia Hills, hunting, spend-

of the bank, chairs the Enter-

ing time with his family and

prise Risk Management Team

playing golf. Dye lives in Bir-

and leads the loan operations

mingham with his wife, Paige,

group.

and their two children.

ANDREA FROST is a vice pres-

ALLEN HAMILTON, with more than 20 years of lending expe-

ident and the compliance

rience, is Southwest Alabama

officer at First Citizens Bank

market president for Smart-

in Luverne. She graduated

Bank, based in Thomasville.

from Troy University with a

At SmartBank, Hamilton over-

bachelor’s degree in business

sees and manages the bank’s

administration – finance. Frost

presence and growth strategy

has 17 years of banking expe-

in Washington and Clarke

JASON ISBELL is a senior vice

rience, starting her career at

counties. Hamilton graduated

president and head of state

40 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024 2021

JASON ISBELL

SPECIAL SECTION

CHRIS KING is vice president director of marketing for Bank Independent. In 2024, his team was selected as a finalist for the Top 100 Marketing Teams

by OnCon. King, an Auburn

RISING STARS

University graduate, completed the American Bankers Association’s Bank Marketing School and earned his Certified Financial Marketing Professional credential. He has served on the

CHRIS KING government affairs and economic development at Regions Bank, overseeing the bank’s government affairs efforts in 16 state capitals. Isbell joined Regions in 2021 after working for the Alabama Legislature, the Alabama Bankers Association and the law firm of Maynard Cooper & Gale. He graduated from Faulkner University and completed his MBA at Auburn University Montgomery and law degree at the Thomas Goode Jones School of Law. He also graduated from the Alabama Banking School, where he later served as class director. Isbell lives in Pike Road with his wife, Kim, and their two sons. Isbell is active in his church, serves as a volunteer or director for several nonprofit organizations, is an adjunct law professor, and is a member of the Faulkner University board of trustees.

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 41

RISING STARS

SPECIAL SECTION

ABA’s CFMP Exam Advisory

earned a Bachelor of Science in

Board Work Group since 2017.

Business from Troy University.

King also completed executive

She is an avid volunteer for the

education at Wharton Business

Mobile Chamber of Commerce,

School. He currently serves as

furthering her commitment to

the marketing instructor for

economic development. She

Alabama Banking School. King

and her husband, Ryan, have

and his family live in Tuscum-

three children.

bia, where he joined the city council in 2023. He is active on several nonprofit boards and organizations.

RACHEL NEW

DAVID NORVELL is a seasoned banking professional with more than 13 years of experi-

of experience in the financial

ence specializing in commer-

industry, New is an expert at

cial relationships. As a vice

and treasury management offi-

helping local businesses navi-

president at PNC, a native of

cer at River Bank & Trust, serv-

gate the complexities of man-

Florence and a graduate of the

ing the bank’s Coastal Region.

aging their financial operations.

University of North Alabama,

With more than two decades

New, a native of Saraland,

he provides tailored financial

RACHEL NEW is vice president

42 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024 2021

SPECIAL SECTION

DAVID NORVELL

GABE PELUSO III

advice to clients across Ala-

before moving to his current

bama’s northern region with

role in May 2023. Peluso enjoys

a keen understanding of the

spending time with his family,

needs of North Alabama’s

hunting, fishing and playing

local businesses. He is active-

golf.

ly involved in the community,

RISING STARS

CAMERON RICKS

CAMERON RICKS is first vice president of commercial banking at ServisFirst Bank.

A graduate of the University of North Alabama, he holds a

serving on the board of the Limestone County Economic Development Association, and when he’s not busy serving clients and community, he enjoys spending time with family or pursuing passions like golf, fishing and sports.

GABE PELUSO III is a commercial relationship officer at Renasant Bank in Huntsville. A graduate of Trinity’s West Morgan High School and Mississippi State University (BA in business administration – finance), he was a part-time teller for Renasant Bank during college.

He joined the bank full-time after graduation, working as an assistant relationship manager

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 43

RISING STARS

SPECIAL SECTION

degree in political science, but

bank committees and currently

sits on the Wetumpka Cham-

he has a decade of experience

contributing as a board mem-

ber board of directors. Spear

in the banking industry. Ricks

ber for Shoals Scholar Dollars.

and her husband, Phillip, live

is treasurer for the Birmingham

He is currently a third-year stu-

in Eclectic with their three

Sunrise Rotary Club and holds

dent at the Alabama Banking

daughters.

key positions in the American

School. Sherrill and his wife,

Legion Alabama Boys State

Lacy, have three children.

and the Alabama Youth Sports Alliance. He’s on the board of the Alabama Sports Council and is a member of the 2024 freshman class of the Birmingham Monday Morning Quarterback Club. Ricks is active in his church, roots for Alabama football and likes to play golf

JEANNE THOMAS

and travel.

REBECCA SPEAR

REBECCA SPEAR is vice pres-

JONATHAN SHERRILL

JONATHAN SHERRILL has more

JEANNE THOMAS is lender and branch manager of First Metro Bank’s main office. She’s been at the bank for 15 years,

ident/retail manager/branch

starting as a part-time teller

manager of CB&S Bank in

and working in positions such

Wetumpka. She has more than

as customer service represen-

21 years of banking experi-

tative and assistant branch

ence and has served five of

manager. Her goal is to equip

those years with CB&S Bank.

people in her community with

Spear is a graduate of Ala-

the tools they need to build

bama Banking School. She has

their credit and achieve their

been a Kiwanis Club Member,

financial goals. A native of

a board member for a local

Muscle Shoals, Thomas grad-

than 15 years of experience in

children’s advocacy center and

uated from the University of

banking, with the last decade

Wetumpka Area Chamber of

North Alabama with a degree

dedicated to CB&S Bank as

Commerce ambassador. She

in business administration. In

a retail manager overseeing

and her branch also volunteer

her free time, Thomas enjoys

operations across four coun-

to collect money for a charity

trying new restaurants, taking

ties in North Alabama. His role

event the local humane shelter

her dogs to the park, singing

extends to serving on various

hosts every year. She currently

and axe throwing with friends.

44 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 45

RISING STARS

SPECIAL SECTION

ipated in the Alabama Banker’s Association’s Bank Executive Leadership Certification Program and is enrolled in the LSU Graduate Banking Program. He graduated from the Universi-

GEORGIA CLAIRE VARBLE is director of market development for First Metro Bank, headquartered in Muscle Shoals. A graduate of the University of

ty of Alabama with a finance degree and is a graduate of the Alabama Banker’s School. Tug-

JEREMY TUGGLE

JEREMY TUGGLE is Birmingham

gle is treasurer for the Trussville Daybreak Rotary Club and is a past president of the Trussville Area Chamber of Commerce board. He is an education ad-

city president for Bryant Bank,

vocate in Trussville and has run

overseeing seven locations

the New York City Marathon.

in the area. A banker with 22

Tuggle and his wife, Lauren, and

years of experience, he partic-

four children live in Trussville.

46 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024 2021

GEORGIA CLAIRE VARBLE

SPECIAL SECTION

RISING STARS

North Alabama with a degree

10 years, including risk,

in communications, Varble has

compliance and retail posi-

earned a certificate in bank

tions. Williams graduated from

marketing and is a Certified

the University of Alabama with

Financial Marketing Profes-

a degree in public relations

sional, both from the American

and marketing and did grad-

Bankers Association. She’s a

uate studies in business and

member of Leadership Shoals,

project management. Williams

serves as a volunteer alum-

is president of PNC’s African

na-advisor for the UNA chapter

American Employee Business

of Alpha Delta Pi Sorority and volunteers for community or-

LISA WILLIAMS

ganizations in her hometown in Tennessee and in the Shoals.

Resource Group and a member of Women’s Connect and the Corporate Responsibility

providing financial resources

Group’s D&I Council, where she

for underserved communities

is vice president. She’s active

in Alabama and the Florida

in the Alpha Kappa Alpha

ident in PNC’s Community

Panhandle. Williams has been

Sorority. Williams lives in

Development Banking Group,

in banking for more than

Birmingham.

LISA WILLIAMS is a vice pres-

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 47

MANUFACTURING

D

ewar Gaines has always had the heart of an entrepreneur.

From his earliest memories of lemonade stands to his current role as the head of a multimillion-dollar dog treat company, his journey has been one of relentless drive and an instinct for marketing, of ups and downs, successes and failures.

It’s all led to Gaines founding and being CEO of Gaines Family Farmstead, an Irondale-based dog-treat maker that is now one of the fastest-growing private companies in the U.S.

Entrepreneur from the start Gaines showed his entrepreneurial spirit early.

“I had lemonade sales at about 4 years old and little businesses in junior high and high school,” he says. Born and raised in Birmingham, he attended McCallie School in Chattanooga for high school before embarking on an adventurous path.

After two years of college, Gaines headed to Montana before returning a few years later to finish his degree at Birmingham-Southern College. There, he played football with his younger brother, Paden, and experienced his first taste of entrepreneurship in the tech space.

DOGGED DETERMINATION Dewar Gaines’ journey to multimillion-dollar pet brand

By ALEC HARVEY — Photos by CARY NORTON

Dewar Gaines has taken Gaines Family Farmstead from the brink of failure during the pandemic to a place on the Inc. 5000 fastestgrowing companies list.

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 49

M A N U FAC T U R I N G

“

We started buying empty bags, printing labels, slapping a label on the front of the bags and hand-stuffing bags, one at a time. There’s a picture of Gaggie, my mom’s mom, hand-packing bags at 92 years old in our little warehouse.”

— Dewar Gaines

His senior year, Gaines launched an injury prevention app, Throw Like a Pro, with renowned sports surgeon Dr. James Andrews. While the business ultimately was unsuccessful, Gaines credits it with teaching him a valuable lesson. “I think we were a little bit early, and I also didn’t know what I was doing,” he says.

“But I got national media attention out of it and recognized then that I had a knack for marketing.”

A new passion: dog treats After the app, Gaines pivoted into digital marketing, helping others build brands and tell their stories. He owned his own digital marketing company for a bit, but it was while working for another marketing agency that Gaines found himself in the world of pet treats.

He helped a client grow a dog treat company and soon realized he wanted to run his own business again. “I didn’t want to work for somebody else,” he says.

Gaines quit his job and moved to a Motel 6 in St. Louis to pursue a deal to bring that dog treat company to Birmingham.

The deal fell apart, but Gaines didn’t let that stop him.

“I came home, and about 90 days later, Gaines Family Farmstead was born,” he says. “I said, if we can’t buy the company, we’ll compete with them head-on.”

For Gaines, dogs were part of the family. He grew up around them — his father’s parents raised Weimaraners on a farm, and his mother’s family were avid dog lovers. A pivotal moment came when Gaines’ family lost their dog, Beam, to rawhide poisoning, a tragedy they didn’t realize was even possible.

That loss inspired Gaines to create a healthier, all-natural alternative for dogs. “The ingredient panels of dog treats are disgusting most of the time,” he says. “We recognized the importance of clean, healthy, natural ingredients sourced from American farmers.”

From farmers markets to more sales In October 2016, Gaines founded what was briefly Gaines Pet Treats, changing the name of the company in March 2017 after creating three brands: Gaines Family Farmstead, Farm to Fido 50 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

and Gaines Pet Farm.

“Farm to Fido was my favorite, but we polled 15,000 pet owners in the United States, and Gaines Family Farmstead won by a landslide,” says Gaines, 37, who lives in Birmingham with his wife and two children.

And a family affair it was, with Paden quitting his own marketing job to work with his brother, and their mother and grandmother helping in the early days.

“We started buying empty bags, printing labels, slapping a label on the front of the bags and hand-stuffing bags, one at a time,” Gaines recalls. “There’s a picture of Gaggie, my mom’s mom, hand-packing bags at 92 years old in our little warehouse.”

The family took their homemade sweet potato treats to farmers markets and small local stores, slowly building a grassroots following.

Sweet potatoes became the core of their product line, which now includes beef and chicken treats.

“We knew the single-ingredient, sweet potato market was growing,” Gaines says. He and his brother spent hours experimenting with the right thickness, blanching time and dehydration process to create the perfect dog treat.

“There was a lot of trial and error, cut fingers, burned sweet potatoes and undercooked sweet potatoes,” Gaines says.

And there was a taste-tester. Duke, Gaines’ beloved Italian Mastiff, died earlier this year, but he spent years as Gaines Family Farmstead’s unofficial mascot. “He was the official taste-tester real quick, and he would go to all the farmers markets with us,” he says. “People would flock to our booth to see this little puppy.”

Eventually, using a manufacturer in South Alabama, the company launched with its sweet potato products. Just sweet potato.

“We literally took a sweet potato, pulled it out of the ground for the single-ingredient treats, and shaped it into either a french fry, a long chew, or into the shape of a sweet potato chip,” Gaines says. “And those were the first products that we launched.”

Six months later, though, the South Alabama manufacturer shut down. So, Gaines and his brother did the work themselves.

“We raised a little bit of money from a group of Birmingham investors, and we bought a commercial dehydrator and other

M A N U FAC T U R I N G

equipment, including a 50-gallon crawfish cooker,” Gaines says.

“We started hand-slicing sweet potatoes, blanching 90 pounds at a time, which would bake around 15 pounds of finished product.

It would take seven or eight hours, so we could get three cooks in in a day. … I literally had a futon in the warehouse.”

A breakthrough came in 2019, when Paden Gaines visited the headquarters of Southeast Pet, a premiere pet treat distributor. He left that day with Gaines Family Farmstead’s first distribution deal, opening the doors to independent pet stores throughout the Southeast. That year, the company grew from one distributor to four, and at the following year’s Global Pet Expo, Gaines and company met with TJ Maxx, Costo and Chewys.com.

Navigating challenges and viral moments The Global Pet Expo was in March 2020, and just days after returning from the successful trip, the pandemic shut the world down.

“We really were basically dead at that point,” Gaines says. But his gambler’s instinct paid off when TJ Maxx needed inventory due to supply chain issues with China. Gaines Family Farmstead stepped in and received large orders that kept the company afloat.

During the pandemic, Paden Gaines left the company (though he’s still a partner and has some ownership in it), and Dewar Gaines managed to keep Gaines Family Farmstead afloat, launching new products (including the company’s best-selling sweet potato bone) and expanding into 35 states.

And then, in 2022, Gaines Family Farmstead participated in the brand accelerator program at Amazon and was the subject of a 60-second brand video on the online marketplace that went viral, garnering 27 million views in just four days. They were also among the products selected for Amazon’s Holiday Gift Guide.

“We were out of inventory from November through January,” Gaines says. “You can’t predict viral moments.”

Going global and the Inc. 5000 2023 was a banner year for Gaines Family Farmstead.

Anna Byrd and Chandler Gaines package up pig ear dog treats to ship to customers.

In January 2023, the company secured a deal with Chewy.com, followed by its first order from Costco. “That one order from one region of Costco was more revenue than we did in the two previous years combined,” Gaines says.

In March 2023, the company raised $1.1 million in Series B funding, led by Skip Brock Sr. “These are guys in business who have been my mentors for a very long time,” Gaines says of his investors.

The company’s revenue jumped from $480,000 in 2022 to more than $2.2 million in 2023, earning a spot in the top 500 of this year’s Inc. 5000 list of fastest-growing companies.

In 2024, the company also expanded internationally, launching in Canada and Europe, with plans for South Korea and Panama. In August, Gaines Family Farmstead rolled out new packaging for its products.

“We moved into a small warehouse, and now we’re in another warehouse,” says Gaines, who has two other full-time employees and a number of contractors. “In a year we’ll probably have outgrown this warehouse.”

Clean ingredients, relentless drive At the heart of Gaines Family Farmstead’s success is the growing trend of the humanization of pet treats. “People want their dogs to eat clean, all-natural, limited-ingredient products just like they do,” Gaines says.

But beyond the trends and the clean ingredients, Gaines attributes their success to something much simpler: perseverance.

“We never quit,” he says. “When we started, people were already selling hundreds of thousands of bags a month of sweet potato products. We knew if we could just get the marketing right and the messaging right and the customer base right, we had a winner. And that’s what we did.”

Alec Harvey is executive editor of Business Alabama and Cary Norton is a freelance contributor. Both are based in Birmingham.

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 51

SPOTLIGHT

Colbert & Lauderdale Counties

Lauderdale County Colbert County

by LORI CHANDLER PRUITT

Downtown Sheffield. Photo by @billingsley_photography.

Wilson Lake Renaissance Tower.

Photo by @billingsley_photography.

C

olbert and Lauderdale counties, in the northwest corner of Alabama, are known as the Shoals. With beautiful natural resources, tourism, quality of life for residents and visitors and robust economic development, the four main cities — Florence, Tuscumbia, Muscle Shoals and Sheffield — are very desirable places to live.

The Tennessee River, pretty downtowns and major projects that add amenities for all ages are common here. Many throughout the world have heard of the Shoals’ music heritage; Tuscumbia is the childhood home of Helen Keller; and W.C. Handy, the “father of the blues,” hailed from Florence. All these things provide a rich historical backdrop and popular events that attract visitors worldwide. The Shoals area is known for sports tourism as well.

The Shoals Economic Development Authority has several goals in mind with a multi-faceted approach. While they have targeted automotive suppliers, information technology, advanced manufacturing and aerospace industries, another very tangible target is music and film production, officials say.

That sector, building on the area’s heritage as the Hit Recording Capital of the World, is growing through the Shoals Music Makers Recording Incentive, a support and point of contact for those who wish to record or film in the area. Eligible applicants for the incentive program can receive up to 30% of their budget back.

Since it started two years ago, the program has brought in 31 artists and musicians, $240,000 and generated one Grammy.

Rattlesnake Saloon. Photo courtesy of the Florence-Lauderdale Convention & Visitors Bureau.

Another successful, out-of-the-box program is Remote Shoals, which offers workers from all over the chance to receive up to $10,000 to relocate to the Shoals. Launched in 2019, and recently funded again through June 2025, the Remote Shoals program has brought 130 remote workers to the region and a total of 260 newcomers. To date, more than 3,000 people have applied.

Another program, the Shoals Alabama Launchpad, is a competitive grant-awarding program that nurtures startup businesses.

The Shoals Business Incubator, open since 1992, has encouraged more than 150 businesses and created more than 1,500 jobs. And Shoals Shift works to expand the area’s digital technology cluster and build a tech hub.

The economic development agency owns all of the industrial parks in the two counties, and its work is supported by a halfcent sales tax that goes into the Shoals Economic Development Fund. The fund helps pay for speculative buildings, incentives and other assistance. This has resulted in major industry announcements that bring many jobs. Two new spec buildings are planned.

The largest manufacturing employers in the Shoals include North American Lighting, an auto supplier; Constellium, which makes aluminum; Essity, a paper products company; Linamar, which makes EV battery trays; Tarkett Alabama, which makes vinyl flooring; and Southwire Co., which makes insulated copper wire.

Another major economic engine is the Florence-Lauderdale County Port Authority, handling tons of material, storing and October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 53

S P O T L I G H T: OV E R V I E W

M E D I A N H O U S E H O L D I N CO M E

P O P U L AT I O N Total Alabama Population: 5,108,468

Limestone County: $80,146 Madison County: $78,058 Baldwin County: $71,039 Jefferson County: $63,595 Montgomery County: $56,707 Colbert County: $56,149 Lauderdale County: $56,081 State of Mobile County: $55,352 Alabama Lawrence County: $54,786 $59,609 Franklin County: $47,359 Source: U.S. Census Bureau

Jefferson County: 662,895 Madison County: 412,600 Mobile County: 411,640 Baldwin County: 253,507 Montgomery County: 224,980 Limestone County: 114,654 Lauderdale County: 96,814 Colbert County: 58,361 Lawrence County: 33,502 Franklin County: 31,802 Source: U.S. Census Bureau

shipping products locally and beyond. The port continues to grow, as does the Northwest Alabama Regional Airport.

Aerospace is still a major goal. Recently, Florida-based AE Industrial Partners acquired the 2 million-square-foot, 638-acre facility originally built to produce railroad cars. The goal is to renovate it to serve as an aerospace center of excellence, officials say.

The Shoals also is a health care and retail hub for the region.

School systems work to provide opportunities for K-12 students, as well as adult learners. An Innovation Center will soon open in Florence for Lauderdale County schools, and a partnership will open a Workforce Development Center for students and adults

who need skills training or retraining. The region also is home to the University of North Alabama, a community college and a four-year private college.

Cities are always busy with improvement projects. The Tennessee River provides a beautiful backdrop for riverwalk parks, trails and other amenities. Several high-dollar projects, such as a new UNA stadium, a sportsplex in Muscle Shoals and more, highlight the growth here.

54 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

Lori Chandler Pruitt is a Birmingham-based freelance contributor to Business Alabama.

Economic Engines To date, the initiative has had more than 3,000 applicants.

Another innovative program to boost economic development is the Shoals Music Makers program. This program, started two years ago, offers artists up to 30% of their budget back for choosing to record in the Shoals. So far, the program has brought in 31 artists and musicians, $240,000 and one Grammy.

AUTOMOTIVE/ADVANCED MANUFACTURING

The Shoals Research Airpark speculative building offers 250,000 square feet of space zoned for heavy industrial activity.

TECHNOLOGY/INNOVATION/ ENTREPRENEURSHIP

The Shoals area has several programs that work to increase collaboration and partnerships to build a culture of entrepreneurship and innovation among students, budding entrepreneurs and existing business owners.

Those include the Shoals Alabama Launchpad, a competitive program that nurtures startup businesses. It has awarded thousands in grants. The Shoals Business Incubator, open since 1992, has helped more than 150 businesses and created

B U S I N E S S AUGUST 2024: Dirt is moving on the $50 million West Village project in Florence, touted as the first walkable neighborhood in the Shoals, with a variety of housing options, neighborhood shops, parks and public gathering spaces. It is being planned for the former Eliza Coffee Memorial Hospital site.

JULY 2024: Colbert County Tourism recently was named Organization of the Year by Alabama State Tourism. Visitors spent more than $115 million

more than 1,500 jobs. And Shoals Shift works to expand the area’s digital technology cluster and build a tech hub.

The Shoals Economic Development Authority’s Remote Shoals program, which offers remote workers the chance to receive up to $10,000 to relocate to the Shoals community, received funding through June 2025. It launched in 2019 and since then, the program has welcomed more than 130 remote workers, totaling more than 260 new citizens.

These remote workers bring with them more than $13 million in annual payroll.

The Shoals has a diverse manufacturing base and in recent years has grown in sectors such as automotive and metals.

Those sectors are still highly sought after by local economic developers.

The largest manufacturing employer in the Shoals is North American Lighting, which makes automotive lighting fixtures and recently expanded, followed by Constellium, which manufactures aluminum.

Other major employers represent wood and flooring products, paper and plastic products, caskets, fireworks, fertilizer and protein processing.

The Shoals Economic Development Authority owns all nine industrial parks in the area, a move that helps streamline and market the area. And SEDA ensures that speculative buildings are available for new and expanding industry.

B R I E F S on tourism, and, over the past five years, lodging revenue has doubled.

JUNE 2024: Ground is broken for the Bank Independent Stadium at the University of North Alabama. The $65 million cost will be funded by a capital campaign that has already raised $25 million, UNA athletics department reserved funds and construction loans.

JULY 2024: A new Veterans Affairs clinic in Sheffield is

expected to open later this year. It will double the space for treating veterans and will add more services, such as optometry and audiology, allowing veterans to receive care at home instead of traveling to other cities.

JUNE 2024: Additional funding through July 2025 is approved for the Shoals EDA’s Remote Shoals program, which offers remote workers the chance to receive up to $10,000 to relocate to the Shoals communities.

JUNE 2024: Forbes names Bank Independent, based in the Shoals, among America’s BestIn-State Banks for 2024 in its annual nationwide list. The bank was ranked No. 1 in the state.

JUNE 2024: The second cohort of the Code AL completes the course. The program, launched in 2023, came out of a partnership with the Shoals EDA, the University of North Alabama’s Center for Learning

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 55

S P O T L I G H T: ECO N O M I C E N G I N E S

TAXES

The Florence-Lauderdale County Port Authority (FLPA) is a public port authority established as a special district of the city of Florence and Lauderdale County.

PROPERTY TAX County only

LAUDERDALE COUNTY: 10.5 mills COLBERT COUNTY: 8.5 mills STATE OF ALABAMA: 6.5 MILLS

SALES TAX LAUDERDALE COUNTY: 1.5% Cities within the county:

ANDERSON: 2% FLORENCE: 4.5% KILLEN: 2% LEXINGTON: 3% ROGERSVILLE: 2% ST. FLORIAN: 3% WATERLOO: 2.5% COLBERT COUNTY: 1.5% Cities within the county:

CHEROKEE: 3.5% LEIGHTON: 3.5% LITTLEVILLE: 4% MUSCLE SHOALS: 3.5% SHEFFIELD: 4% TUSCUMBIA: 3.5%

FLORENCE-LAUDERDALE COUNTY PORT AUTHORITY/NORTHWEST ALABAMA REGIONAL AIRPORT

STATE OF ALABAMA: 4% Source: Alabama Department of Revenue

From a half-cent sales tax, the Shoals Economic Development Fund offers incentives and other help to industry, industrial park improvements, spec buildings and more. It has helped new and existing companies with job creation as well through its Employment Growth Program.

B U S I N E S S and Professional Development and the TVA’s Economic Development arm. Students who complete this boot camp receive a fundamental understanding of programming concepts and get hands-on experience with two popular programming languages.

JUNE 2024: Voters overwhelmingly approve a 5-mill property tax renewal to benefit Tuscumbia city schools.

The vote renews the tax for 30 more years.

The Florence-Lauderdale County Port Authority (FLPA) is a public port authority established as a special district of the city of Florence and Lauderdale County. The FLPA is a 45-acre lease-hold port with various tenants carrying out the operations of the facility’s terminals. The FLPA location near the confluence of the Tennessee River and Tombigbee Waterway provides a direct link to the Gulf of Mexico. The port handles an average of

450,000 tons of cargo a year, particularly of goods such as corn, soybeans, grain sorghum, wheat, concrete sand, feldspar, granite fines, fertilizer, cotton seed, aluminum and silica. It has the capacity to handle a million tons a year.

Tenants of the FLPA include American Metal Chemical Corp., Alliance Sand, James Marine Inc., McDaniel Service LLC, Woodall Grain Co. and Tennessee Southern Railroad. Companies served by the port account for an $80 million payroll and about 2,500 jobs.

The FLPA recently completed a

B R I E F S MAY 2024: The city of Muscle Shoals announces plans for a 66-acre, $65 million sportsplex and event center that will adjoin a retail development.

The sportsplex will have indoor and outdoor sports facilities, an amphitheater-style music venue and more. It is planned for the intersection of U.S. highways 72 and 43.

APRIL 2024: Ground is broken for the Lauderdale County Schools Innovation Center, to be built on Highway 72 as part

56 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

of the agricultural center site. It will replace the system’s aging career tech building and will not only accommodate more students, but also host night classes for adults who want to obtain career certificates. It is set to open for the 2026-27 school year.

MARCH 2024: The Shoals Music Makers program continues to recruit new music production to the Shoals area. This program, started two years ago, offers artists a refund of up to 30% of

their budget for recording in the Shoals. So far, the program has brought in 31 artists and musicians, $240,000 and one Grammy.

JANUARY 2024: AE Industrial Partners, a private equity firm specializing in aerospace, national security and industrial services, announces that its affiliate has acquired a 2 millionsquare-foot, 638-acre industrial facility, originally built for rail car manufacturing, from the Retirement Systems of Alabama.

S P O T L I G H T: ECO N O M I C E N G I N E S

$1.9 million dredging project that will provide access to the port year-round. A 2024 earmark has been established for the renovation of the public dock in the amount of $3.4 million, which is warranted to keep the FLPA fully operational and to promote growth and development.

Northwest Alabama Regional Airport in Muscle Shoals, owned by Lauderdale and Colbert counties, also is an economic driver. Recently, the Shoals Economic Development Authority announced its 2023 Product Development Plan. In addition to the 27,000-square-foot hangar for aircraft MRO development at the Northwest Alabama Regional Airport, this plan includes the construction of two speculative buildings. Construction is expected to be completed in 2024.

The airport also is planning to launch new service and do some terminal modifications, officials say.

paid off.

Tourism is a major industry here.

That’s due to not only the area’s rich music heritage but also the Helen Keller Festival, the W.C. Handy Music Festival, the Tuscumbia Depot, a Frank Lloyd Wright-designed home and an annual Trail of Tears commemoration, along with golf, tennis and sports tourism.

The area also is on the Tennessee River, leading to riverwalks, kayaking and canoeing sites, and more.

MUSIC HERITAGE/TOURISM

HIGHER EDUCATION

The Shoals is home to the rich history of the Muscle Shoals Sound — with studios that have made history with their legendary recording — and SEDA has developed an incentive plan for those who wish to record or film in the area.

Under the program, approved recipients who record in Lauderdale or Colbert counties receive a reimbursement of up to 30% of their budget, which boosts economic development as well.

As to retail, the counties sit in a tri-state corridor, so retail is big business here. Many downtown districts are beefing up their efforts, too, and it has

B U S I N E S S AEI plans to renovate the facility to serve as an aerospace center of excellence anchored in the Shoals area.

MAY 2024: Colbert County officials hope to finish design and plans for a new jail, with bids accepted by the end of August or early September.

Officials have been told the new jail could be ready by January 2026.

FEBRUARY 2024: The Shoals EDA’s Florence AdvantageSite

Largest Industrial Employers NORTH AMERICAN LIGHTING MUSCLE SHOALS Automotive lighting fixtures 1,500 employees

CONSTELLIUM | MUSCLE SHOALS Aluminum manufacturing 1,300 employees

HEALTH CARE

Hospitals are among the largest employers in the county, and this sector continues to grow.

Patients are served by North Alabama Medical Center in Florence and its sister hospital, North Alabama Shoals Hospital in Muscle Shoals. Helen Keller Hospital is located in Sheffield.

ESSITY | BARTON

Paper products • 550 employees

LINAMAR | MUSCLE SHOALS

EV battery trays • 470 employees

TARKETT ALABAMA | FLORENCE Vinyl flooring • 399 employees

SOUTHWIRE CO. | FLORENCE

The Shoals has three institutions of higher learning, and postsecondary education is a large economic driver. The schools and college are also very active in workforce development.

The University of North Alabama in Florence is one of the largest employers in Lauderdale County. Also in Lauderdale County is Heritage Christian University in Florence, a private school.

Likewise, in Colbert County, Northwest Shoals Community College is one of the county’s largest employers. The school has a campus in the Shoals and another in Phil Campbell.

Insulated copper electrical wire 385 employees

FLEXCO CORP. | TUSCUMBIA

Vinyl floor covering • 222 employees

WHITESELL CORP. | MUSCLE SHOALS Fasteners • 204 employees

THACKER CASKET INC. | FLORENCE Burial caskets • 175 employees

HOLCIM ELEVATE | FLORENCE

Membrane roofing • 173 employees Source: Shoals Economic Development Authority

B R I E F S receives state funds through the Site Evaluation and Economic Development Strategy Act. NOVEMBER 2023: Ground is broken for the Lauderdale County Workforce Development Center, part of the Lauderdale County Agricultural Center project. The $26 million project should be completed within two years, providing job training and geared toward upper-level education. TVA has donated $8 million for equipment and training.

NOVEMBER 2023: Bank Independent, founded in Colbert County more than 75 years ago, breaks ground on a new operations center in Muscle Shoals, a four-story, 100,000-square-foot complex on 50 acres. It should be complete in late 2025.

SEPTEMBER 2023: The Shoals EDA announces its 2023 Product Development Plan. In addition to the 27,000-plus-squarefoot hangar for aircraft MRO development at the Northwest

Alabama Regional Airport, this plan includes the construction of two speculative buildings.

Construction is expected to be completed in 2024.

JUNE 2023: Southwire announces an expansion of its Florence manufacturing facility, with plans to increase production capacity by 30% and create some 120 jobs.

Source: Economic developers

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 57

Health Care Helen Keller Hospital has served its community for more than 100 years.

NORTH ALABAMA MEDICAL CENTER/ NORTH ALABAMA SHOALS HOSPITAL

North Alabama Medical Center opened its doors in 2018 as the replacement facility for Eliza Coffee Memorial Hospital in Florence. North Alabama Medical Center serves as a regional facility with more than 200 physicians on staff, representing more than 42 specialty areas of medicine. The 263-bed facility offers the community’s only openheart surgery site, a complete line of women’s and children’s services, and a complete line of medical and imaging services.

The hospital is very active in workforce development. Recently, it agreed to partner with Northwest Shoals Community College to provide more than 5,100 square feet of space at its Cloyd Boulevard campus to assist with health care education initiatives. This is after NWSCC was awarded a $1.3 million state grant aimed at addressing health care needs in four rural counties of northwest Alabama — Colbert, Franklin, Lauderdale and Lawrence.

The Cloyd campus currently hosts NAMC’s Sleep Center, Wound Center, Outpatient Imaging and Center for Breast Health.

With the donated space, the college plans to launch a stand-alone Licensed Practical Nursing (LPN) program, increasing access to nursing education for students in the region. It will also provide

The Cardiac Catheterization Lab at North Alabama Medical Center completed a cardiac electrophysiology procedure on its 700th patient in June.

North Alabama Shoals Hospital has 178 beds.

dual enrollment pathways for LPN certification. Initiatives also include a non-credit health studies training center, offering

specialized programs to meet the evolving needs of health care professionals.

North Alabama Medical Center accoOctober 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 59

S P O T L I G H T: H E A LT H C A R E

lades include Platinum Recognition from the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) for educating and promoting organ donation awareness. In 2023, North Alabama Medical Center produced seven organ donor heroes and had 19 life-saving organs recovered from transplants. There were 20 bone and tissue donors, resulting in up to 2,000 recipients of an enhanced quality of life.

NAMC also had 29 eye donors and 58 recipients of new sight.

NAMC’s Center for Women and Children offers obstetrics and gynecology care, as well as pediatrics, breast health and educational classes for new and expecting mothers.

Its sister facility, North Alabama Shoals Hospital in Muscle Shoals, was founded in 1968 by a group of physicians dedicated to serving residents of Colbert County. Today, the 178-bed, general acute care facility boasts private rooms for all patients as well as a 24-hour emergency department, medical and oncology ser-

60 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

vices, medical/surgical inpatient units and an intensive care and short-stay surgery units. Shoals is also Joint Commission accredited, is a Blue Cross Blue Shield Tier 2 Hospital and has received a Blue Distinguished award in hip and knee replacements.

The American College of Cardiology recently recognized North Alabama Shoals Hospital for its expertise and commitment in treating patients with chest pain. The hospital was recently awarded Chest Pain Center Accreditation based on rigorous onsite evaluation of the staff’s ability to evaluate, diagnose and treat patients who may be experiencing a heart attack.

HELEN KELLER HOSPITAL

Helen Keller Hospital, in Sheffield, has 185 beds and 1,098 employees, one of Colbert County’s largest employers. It offers comprehensive services, including ambulance and ER, cardiac services, imaging, infusion, intensive care/progressive

care, pediatrics, lab/pathology, outpatient surgery, rehab services/sports medicine, sleep disorders center, social services, surgery, a well care and fitness center and a women’s center.

It has served the community for more than 100 years, and continually updates services. The hospital just implemented a new EMR-Cerner system, which enables health care providers to share information more effectively and have the complete picture of a patient’s care.

The hospital is one of only two in Alabama to receive CMS Sepsis Recertification, and is a Blue Cross Designated Blue Distinction Center+ Knee and Hip Replacement, as well as the Healogics Center of Distinction Award for Keller Wound Healing Center.

The hospital recently renovated and updated one of its operating rooms. Also, the hospital updated its Da Vinci robot to Xi. Red Bay Hospital, in Franklin County, also is part of the system.

Higher Education

UNIVERSITY OF NORTH ALABAMA

The University of North Alabama is an accredited, comprehensive, regional state university offering undergraduate, graduate and doctoral degree programs through the colleges of Arts, Sciences and Engineering; the Sanders College of Business and Technology; Education and Human Sciences; and the Anderson College of Nursing and Health Professions.

Occupying a 130-acre campus in a residential section of Florence, UNA is situated within a four-city area that is known as the Shoals and includes Muscle Shoals, Sheffield and Tuscumbia. UNA is Alabama’s oldest state-funded institution and will commemorate its bicentennial in January of 2030.

UNA is home to more than 10,000 students and offers almost 150 majors and concentrations. It is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges, and offers a variety of study abroad programs, flexible scheduling and online programs.

UNA is known as Alabama’s workforce development university because of its focus on programs that result in jobs for graduates who fill much-needed roles in the area, the state and region.

UNA recently opened a Computing and Mathematics Building that offers classrooms, faculty offices and scenic views of UNA’s historic campus. UNA places among the most elite colleges and universities in the U.S. as part of the Great Places to Work For program, recognized in each of the 10 categories in the program.

In addition, UNA is home to more than a dozen individuals who have been accepted to the Fulbright U.S. Students, the

U.S. government’s flagship international educational exchange program, and UNA is home to the AASCB-accredited Sanders College of Business and Technology.

UNA’s Shine On, Gold comprehensive campaign to raise $100 million is off to a good start. And the Bank Independent University of North Alabama stadium project is underway.

UNA athletics, with seven Division II National Championships, is now a member of NCAA Division I as part of the Atlantic Sun and United Athletic conferences.

NORTHWEST SHOALS COMMUNITY COLLEGE

Northwest Shoals Community College (NWSCC) has provided postsecondary and workforce education for more than 60 years. It offers more than 100 certificate and degree offerings, with both academic and career technical options.

It has two campuses, one in Muscle Shoals and one in Phil Campbell in Franklin County. Enrollment as of spring 2024 is more than 4,200. The college employs just under 500 people from the community, 215 full-time and 284 parttime employees.

The college is well-known for its health studies programs. Students can pursue associate degrees in diagnostic medical sonography, medical assisting technology, emergency medical services, radiography and registered nursing; career certificates for licensed practical nursing and paramedics; and short-term certificates for nursing assistants and EMTs. Medical laboratory technology programs will be added in spring of 2025.

TOP LEFT: Northwest Shoals Community College offers more than 100 certificate and degree programs to its students.

TOP RIGHT: The University of North Alabama will celebrate its bicentennial in January 2030. Photo courtesy of UNA Photography.

The college also has a reputation for successfully preparing students and workers for technical careers. It works with local employers to meet workforce development needs and is the premier option for retraining area workers. Local industries look to the school to develop and customize curriculum to meet their needs and educate underemployed workers.

In fall 2021, Northwest Shoals Community College announced the reinstatement of athletic programs. Beginning in fall 2022, NWSCC fielded baseball and softball teams. That has grown to five teams: baseball, men’s cross country, women’s cross country, softball and volleyball (starting in 2025). Teams compete against various opponents within the Alabama Community College Conference (ACCC) and National Junior Collegiate Athletic Association (NJCAA).

NWSCC offers apprenticeship programs for advanced manufacturing, automotive service, heating, ventilation and air conditioning. Apprenticeships have proven useful for recruiting, training and retaining top industry talent in an increasingly competitive market.

Specific apprenticeship programs include the FAME program, an industrial maintenance apprenticeship. During the five-semester program, students attend October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 65

school two days per week and work for a sponsoring business 24-plus hours per week. Also, the AMPEd program is an advanced manufacturing apprenticeship program that provides work-based learning opportunities to students in industrial systems, machine shop, welding, electrical technology and design engineering.

Further, the NWSCC Power5 HVAC apprenticeship program was the first nationally recognized, competency-based HVAC apprenticeship program in Alabama; and PACE is an automotive service technology apprenticeship where students are given the chance to apply concepts they have learned through ASE-certified instruction while working with a sponsoring business.

The college’s Department of Strategic Partnerships and Industry Training offers several non-credit options and partners with the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers District 711, Local 65 to sign machinist apprentices into a machinist apprenticeship program. It is a non-credit pathway to a career as a machinist for the Tennessee Valley Authority and its partner contractors.

NWSCC is currently engaged in a major campus renovation and construction project of more than $30 million on the Phil Campbell campus.

HERITAGE CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY

Heritage Christian University is a private, nonprofit institution in Florence affiliated with the Churches of Christ. HCU is accredited by the Commission on Accreditation of the Association for Biblical Higher Education.

HCU offers associate, bachelor’s and master’s degrees in religious fields and offers distance learning options.

The Heritage Christian University Graduate School of Theology is seeking accreditation from the Commission on Accrediting.

HCU and the University of North Alabama also have an articulation agreement to facilitate transfer credit and graduate program enrollment. The colleges already have a strong relationship with shared faculty and a contract between Collier Library at UNA and Overton Memorial Library at HCU. 66 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

Movers & Shapers ANDREW BETTERTON is mayor

of Florence.

Before becoming mayor, he worked for 33 years as the CFO for a local electrical supply company. He also served 12 years on the city council and seven on the Florence school board. A University of North Alabama graduate, he also holds a master’s in education from UNA.

KYREL BUCHANAN teaches and

directs the Health Administration graduate program at the University of North Alabama.

She also is the principal consultant at Sanoa Consulting LLC. A Spelman College graduate, she earned her master’s in public health at Emory University and a Ph.D. at Texas A&M University, with post-doctoral credentials from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. She serves on the boards of the Shoals Chamber of Commerce, UNA’s Cole Honors College, the Town & Gown Committee and the Music Preservation Society. She is a graduate of the Alabama Leadership Initiative and Leadership Shoals. Buchanan is a member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc.

SANDRA KILLEN BURROUGHS is

mayor of Lexington and executive director of the Alabama Music Hall of Fame. A University of North Alabama graduate, she holds a Travel Marketing Professional designation from the Southeast Tourism Society and worked several years in tourism. She also is a state board-certified EMT. She is past

chair of the Northwest Alabama Council of Local Governments, and a board member of Northwest Alabama RC&D, Alabama Elk River Development Authority, Shoals Economic Development Authority and the Alabama Mountain Lakes Tourist Association and is a former board member of the Alabama League of Municipalities.

WILLIAM FOSTER is mayor of Tus-

cumbia. He and his family founded the Rattlesnake Saloon and the Seven Springs Lodge, long the subject of national acclaim.

While on the Tuscumbia City Council, he assisted with efforts to revitalize downtown, including the Coldwater Commons Pocket Park, the DesignAlabama project for Spring Park and downtown streetscapes, and helped several new businesses get started. Foster is an Auburn University graduate. He serves on the boards of Shoals Solid Waste Authority and Animal Control and is active with the North Alabama Council of Local Governments.

JEFF GOODWIN is president of

Northwest Shoals Community College, after a 30-year public school career ranging from classroom teacher to superintendent.

Under Goodwin’s leadership, NWSCC has seen rising enrollment, reinstated athletics, and a $30 million renovation and construction project at the school’s Phil Campbell campus. In 2024, Goodwin was recognized with the New President’s Paragon Award by Phi Theta Kappa. He serves on the boards of the Shoals Chamber of Commerce and North Alabama Council of Local Governments. Recently, Goodwin was appointed to the ACCS Athletics Executive Committee. He was Alabama Superintendent of the Year in 2020.

KEVIN HASLAM is vice president

for university advancement and executive director of the UNA Foundation at the University of North Alabama.

The Advancement Team established records in new gifts and commitments in the fiscal years 2022 and 2023, securing $24,865,698 and $34,545,310, respectively. On Sept.

29, 2023, the Team successfully launched Shine On, Gold, the $100 million comprehensive campaign for UNA. A graduate of New Mexico Highlands University, Haslam earned a master’s from Wayne State College and has certifications in fundraising from the Indiana University Lilly School of Philanthropy and Harvard University.

BRAXTON HOLLOWAY was named

COO of North Alabama Shoals Hospital in June 2024. Earlier, he was associate administrator and ethics and compliance officer at the hospital. He holds a bachelor’s degree from Middle Tennessee State University and an MBA from Western Governors University. He also has served as assistant administrator, market director of physician practices and market practice manager at Sumner Regional Medical Center in Gallatin, Tennessee, and was a practice manager at Centennial Thoracic Surgical Associates in Nashville.

MICHELLE FORSYTHE JONES is

CEO of Forsythe and Long Industries in Florence. She is a University of North Alabama graduate with a graduate certificate from Auburn University’s Brewing Science and Operation Program. In 2013, she and her husband, Rob Jones, founded Singin’ River Brewing Co. She also co-founded fertilizer company CRF Tech October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 67

S P O T L I G H T: M OV E R S & S H A PE R S

with her sister, Molly Partlow; then she and her brother-in-law, Kevin Partlow, partnered with a customer to build a fertilizer production facility, which played a pivotal role during the 2021 supply chain crisis. She founded the Tennessee chapter of the Association of Women in the Metal Industries and has worked with UNA’s Women of Influence.

CHRIS KING is a Tuscumbia City

Council member and vice president, director of marketing at Bank Independent. During his tenure, the bank has grown, won honors as a great workplace and for economic development projects including Bank Independent Stadium at UNA. He is a member of the Tuscumbia Kiwanis club, works with nonprofits and sits on the advisory board of Alabama Capital Network. After obtaining Certified Marketing Financial Professional status, King joined the American Bankers Association’s group working to improve the test given to certify bank marketers, and he teaches marketing at Alabama Banking School.

He is a graduate of Auburn University with added credentials from the Wharton School of Business.

MIKE LOCKHART is mayor of Muscle

Shoals, after eight years on the city council.

He has more than 30 years of management experience in the healthcare field, primarily

68 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

at Helen Keller Hospital in Sheffield. He is a member of the Alabama League of Municipalities, where he serves on the board. He is involved with committees of the National League of Cities. Locally, he holds positions on the Shoals Industrial Development Council, the Shoals Metropolitan Transportation Planning Organization and the executive board of the Northwest Alabama Council of Local Government. He has achieved Certified Municipal Officer Emeritus Status and recently completed the Auburn University Intensive Economic Development Training Course.

JOSH LOONEY is director of athletics

at the University of North Alabama. He has ushered UNA into its new NCAA Division I era and led numerous privately funded athletics facilities projects, highlighted by the new Bank Independent Stadium.

Looney began his career in professional sports with the Kansas City Chiefs and Orlando Magic. A graduate of Washburn University, he also has an MBA from the University of Missouri-Kansas City and an Ed.D. from Creighton University.

HALLIE MAULDIN is a fourth-gener-

ation banker with Bank Independent, a $2.7 billion community bank headquartered in the Shoals and its subsidiary Interstate Billing Service. She is a graduate of Auburn University with a bachelor’s degree in marketing. Mauldin is community engagement leader as part of the marketing team and spearheads the bank’s Helping Hands Foundation. She serves

on Auburn University’s Harbert College of Business Board of Young Professionals and as a Shine on Gold Ambassador for the University of North Alabama.

PAUL UNDERWOOD is multi-site

general manager of Linamar, an advanced manufacturing company that makes EV battery trays and more in Muscle Shoals and Hartselle. He has served in this position since 2021, where he has coordinated plant expansions and consolidations, training and other tasks. Before coming to Linamar, he served from 2014 to 2021 as director of manufacturing and lean transformation for Freightcar America. Before then, he was a partner/operator with Performance Werks Racing, where he built record-breaking engines in six different classes. He holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Memphis.

ROGER WILLIAMS is a CPA, share-

holder and president of Patterson Prince and Associates PC. A Birmingham-Southern College graduate, he volunteers in the Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Shoals program and was voted 2023 Big Brother of the Year. He is finance chair for the boards of the Shoals Chamber of Commerce and Shoals Habitat for Humanity and board vice president of Alabama Court Appointed Special Advocates, an organization dedicated to speaking up for abused and neglected children. He is an Alabama Leadership Initiative graduate, receiving the 2024 Alpha Phi Alpha Business Man Award of the Year.

Community Development

Sheffield schools began a capital campaign for funds to upgrade school signage with digital reader boards.

Tuscumbia’s Spring Park includes an evening water show. Photo courtesy of Visit The Shoals.

COLBERT COUNTY

Colbert County is planning a new county jail to be built north of Muscle Shoals by converting empty TVA buildings, officials say, with the size of the facility to be determined once bids come in.

Tuscumbia, the county seat and the birthplace of Helen Keller, is a popular destination attracting worldwide tourism.

The city’s Spring Park will be getting a disc golf course soon.

In the city of Muscle Shoals, which is still growing steadily in population, there is a comprehensive plan that will help address that growth, says Mayor Mike Lockhart.

The city has announced plans for a $65 million sports, retail and entertainment complex. This new development aims to enhance the community’s recreational and economic landscape with

sports facilities, retail shops and entertainment venues, such as an amphitheater.

This project is expected to bring significant growth and opportunities to the area, he says.

“The event center can be modified for different events, such as expos, shows and more,” Lockhart says. “We also will have basketball, volleyball, tennis and pickleball, and outdoor baseball, softball and soccer fields.” The baseball and softball fields will be used by the city’s popular 12-and-under sports program, where more than 800 children play sports on the fields each night, he says.

With all the growth, housing is a priority, he says. A mixed-use housing development is underway with the first phase ongoing, he says. When complete, there will be both housing and commercial development. Retail, casual dining

and a hotel are set to be developed nearby, a public/private partnership, he says.

The city of Sheffield, known as the “Center of the Shoals,” has three historic districts. It is working on an overpass project across the railroad to eliminate traffic delays caused by train traffic. The city also is working on its comprehensive plan.

Education is a priority in the Shoals.

Residents of Tuscumbia recently overwhelmingly approved a 5-mill property tax renewal for the city school system. The tax will be in effect for the next 30 years.

Colbert County, Tuscumbia city and Sheffield city schools all have strong career-tech programs in partnership with local industries and with area colleges.

Sheffield schools began a capital campaign for funds to upgrade school signage with digital reader boards. Beyond boosting the look of the schools, the district is allowing students in business/computer classes a chance to learn how to program the signs and how to use them for marketing purposes, says Lisa Rickman, career coach and public relations spokesman for the district.

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 69

S P O T L I G H T: CO M M U N I T Y D E V E LO PM E N T

The city of Florence, the county seat, opened the new River Heritage Trail in May. LAUDERDALE COUNTY

In Lauderdale County, the third floor of the courthouse is being renovated to add a courtroom for a third judge, says Brenda Bryant, county administrator. And Bush Creek Park in Waterloo will get electrical access for camping sites.

The city of Florence, the county seat, in May opened the new River Heritage Trail. This is the first link of the trail and runs about a mile along the Tennessee River canal, connecting River Heritage Park trailhead to the Patton Island Overlook trailhead. The trail features interpretative displays and overlook points.

“This trail is a long time coming,” says Mayor Andy Betterton. The park has a splash pad, pavilion and more.

70 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

Florence also is rearranging city facilities. A new parking deck opened in September, Betterton says. Next is to tear down the old deck and build a new city hall on the site. Once that is done, the old city hall will be torn down for a municipal parking deck adjacent to the new city hall.

Florence just opened another pod at its sportsplex, which includes five new fields with a Miracle Field, Betterton says. In fact, a league for those with special needs will begin this fall. The city also is building tennis and pickleball fields at Veterans Park, he says.

The city hosts a lot of sporting events, and just recently hosted the 2024 Babe Ruth League World Series that included the all-ages softball division and the 9-year-

old and 11/70 Cal Ripken age groups.

Florence also recently became a stop for American Cruise Lines’ Tennessee Rivers riverboat cruise. And the University of North Alabama in Florence has a $65 million Bank Independent stadium project underway.

A private development underway, West Village Florence, will be a mixed-use community with a variety of housing options, neighborhood shops and restaurants, parks and gathering spaces. It is being billed as the first walkable neighborhood in the Shoals.

Two projects are underway at the state-funded Lauderdale County Agricultural Center in Florence.

One is a $26 million Workforce Development Center to be finished next year, a joint project with the state of Alabama, the Lauderdale County Commission, local K-12 systems and the Tennessee Valley Authority, officials say.

The state has included $3 million in the 2024 Education Trust Fund and TVA has donated $8 million for equipment.

The project will offer upper-level training programs and training for high-demand jobs, officials say.

The second project is Lauderdale County Schools’ Innovation Center, which will sit next to the Workforce Development Center and the agricultural event center. Ground was broken in April.

School leaders say the center will help create more opportunities for students, who have sometimes been turned away for lack of space. When finished, programs will move out of the system’s Allen Thornton Career Technical Center.

Both projects will offer new classes and expanded hours so that students and adults will be able to take courses to learn skills and gain certifications in the evenings.

Florence city schools have several career technical programs, from agriscience to computer science. It has the popular Launch program, which allows juniors and seniors to work in a career field of interest while attending school and provides students with career internship/apprenticeship experiences. It also has an early college program with Northwest Shoals Community College.

Culture & Recreation

Ivy Green.

Florence murals.

ONLY IN THE SHOALS

Florence Indian Mound & Museum is home to Wawmanone, the largest of the Tennessee Valley mounds. In western Colbert County, find the Coon Dog Memorial Graveyard in the Freedom Hills Wildlife Management Area.

MUSIC IN THE AIR

The Shoals region is famed for its musical heritage. Start with the Alabama Music Hall of Fame in Tuscumbia, paying tribute to Alabama’s musical greats with memorabilia, wax figures and a recording studio. Then visit the historic studios — FAME Recording Studios, established in 1959, and renowned for creating “southern rock” and “country soul;” Muscle Shoals Sound Studio Museum, established in 1969, and home to The Swampers; and Cypress Moon Studios in Sheffield, established in 1978.

The legendary musicians of the decades recorded in these three sites — Aretha Franklin, Otis Redding, The Osmonds, The Rolling Stones, Simon & Garfunkel,

Joe Wheeler State Park.

James Brown, Joan Baez, Bob Dylan and Jimmy Buffett.

festivities and events:

SURROUNDED BY HISTORY

ARTS ALIVE 2022 — Florence — May

Ivy Green in Tuscumbia is the birthplace of Helen Keller, where she worked with teacher Annie Sullivan to learn to communicate. The city hosts a festival in her honor each June and The Miracle Worker play is performed for six weeks each summer on the grounds of her home.

In Florence, visit Te-lah-nay’s Wall, built by Tom Hendrix to honor his Yuchi great-great grandmother, who was forced to walk to Oklahoma during the Trail of Tears in the late 1830s. Pope’s Tavern & Museum in Florence has housed a tavern, stage stop and hospital in its 150 years.

Now it displays pioneer artifacts and Civil War memorabilia. The Tuscumbia Depot, built in 1880, was the start of many journeys for Keller and Sullivan.

It now houses railroad memorabilia.

Historic LaGrange College Site Park and early 1800s Cemetery was home to Alabama’s first college. Now it offers

Pike County Lake.

Arts and crafts lovers from across the Southeast gather for this annual event.

SHOALS STORYTELLING FESTIVAL — Florence – May Storytellers come

from far and wide — and so do the listeners.

W.C. HANDY MUSIC FESTIVAL —

Florence — July Ten days of events

honoring Father of the Blues W.C. Handy ALABAMA RENAISSANCE FAIRE —

Florence — October Celebrating the

medieval and Renaissance eras.

MUSCLE SHOALS SONGWRITERS FESTIVAL — Muscle Shoals — November

Some 50 songwriters perform in venues across the Shoals.

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 71

S P O T L I G H T: C U LT U R E & R EC R E AT I O N

Rattlesnake Saloon, in the Appalachian foothills, has 3,500 acres of natural woodlands, horse trails and creative stay places.

W.C. Handy birthplace.

BEAUTIFUL BUILDINGS

Belle Mont Mansion in Tuscumbia is one of Alabama’s most distinguished homes and an excellent example of Jeffersonian style architecture. It was built about 1828. It is now owned by the Alabama Historical Commission and open for tours.

USONION STYLE

The Frank Lloyd Wright Rosenbaum House in Florence, built with cypress, glass and brick, was designed by the famous architect and is a premier example of Usonian-style architecture. It’s the only structure in Alabama designed by Wright.

The O’Neal Bridge over the Tennessee River in Florence. Photo by @billingsley_photography.

a pioneer village illustrating early days’ life. Edith Newman Culver Memorial Museum, in Waterloo in west Lauderdale County, is a town museum featuring Native American artifacts, Civil War relics and Waterloo, one of Alabama’s oldest incorporated towns.

GREAT OUTDOORS

A series of monumental-scale sculptures make up the Singing River Trail, which honors the area’s music heritage. Each sculpture is made of recycled aluminum donated by Wise Alloys. Pictured here is the one in Florence.

72 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

Joe Wheeler State Park, on Wheeler Lake on the Tennessee River, offers a resort lodge, restaurant, cabins, camping, fishing, golf, tennis, swimming, marina and more. You’ll find 300 acres of woods, waterfalls, creeks and bluffs at Shoal Creek Preserve, with trails suitable for horses, mountain bikes and hiking.

River Heritage Park, at the base of the Renaissance Tower, overlooks the Tennessee River and Wilson Dam. It has picnic shelters, a playground and an interactive fountain. River Heritage Trail, overlooking the Tennessee River, just opened here. Riverfront Park, on the Tennessee River in Sheffield, has boat launches, fishing piers and more, including an accessible playground and a pedestrian walkway over the river.

Cane Creek Canyon Nature Preserve, just outside of Tuscumbia, is a 750acre, scenic natural area, with creeks, waterfalls, native plants, and 18 miles of hiking trails. Seven Springs Lodge and

WHAT A VIEW

The Renaissance Tower in Florence soars 30 stories over Wilson Dam and is topped by a revolving restaurant.

ARTS ABOUND

The Kennedy-Douglass Center for the Arts in Florence houses galleries, classes and more. Tennessee Valley Museum of Art displays the Martin Petroglyph carved

by Alabama’s prehistoric residents and other early art.

WATER WONDER

Choreographed lights, music and water jets highlight the Spring Park/Light and Water Show in Tuscumbia. The park is also home to the manmade Coldwater Falls and a train, carousel, roller coaster, playground and splash pad.

SHOWTIME

The Ritz Theatre in Sheffield was built in the 1920s to screen silent movies. Now the Art Deco venue houses community theater and special events.

FORE!

The Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail offers two spectacular championship courses, the Fighting Joe and the Schoolmaster, overlooking Wilson Lake and the Tennessee River in Colbert County.

Company Kudos

by ERICA JOINER WEST

USA Health University Hospital’s Heart Station team has earned continuous accreditation through the Intersocietal Accreditation Commission Echocardiography for the last 20 years. The team is led

by Jamie Creel, RN, BSN, director of the heart and vascular center at University Hospital in Mobile (third from right). Other members of the team were on hand at the award ceremony. A sister hospital, USA Health Providence, also was recognized for cardiac care, earning four stars, the highest marks available, from the American College of Cardiology.

Several Alabama-headquartered accounting firms have been recognized

by Inside Public Accounting on the publication’s Top 500 Firms — Carr Riggs Ingram #25, Warren Averett #45, BMSS LLC #97, Jackson Thornton #145, Kassouf & Co. Inc. #230, JamisonMoneyFarmer PC #298, Anglin Reichmann Armstrong PC #317, Dent Moses LLP #385, Smith Dukes & Buckalew LLP #391, Machen McChesney LLP #406, Wilkins Miller LLC #407, Aldridge Borden #414, Crow Shields Bailey PC #433 and Fenner Melstrom & Dooling PLC #435.

America and Vogue, on Sept. 6. It was one of a 1,000 participants invited to march.

Auburn University was ranked as No. 1 in The Princeton Review’s annual Best 390 Colleges listing for happiest students.

It was the only Alabama school to make the top 25.

SmartBank, which has branches in Alabama, has been certified a Great Place To Work, with 94% of its employees approving of their work environment.

Hyundai was named the top massmarket brand for a fifth consecutive year in the J.D. Power 2024 U.S. Tech Experience Index Study. The 2024 Santa Fe, built in Montgomery, also earned J.D. Power’s Mass Market Infotainment and Connectivity award for its phone-based digital key.

Kilby Laboratory School, operated by the University of North Alabama, has been recognized for its 50th year of accreditation by COGNIA, a global accreditation organization for educational institutions.

Magic City Fashion Week Inc., of Birmingham, recently participated in the Fashion For Our Future march, hosted by the Council of Fashion Designers of

The Prewitt Group, a family-owned risk management firm in Birmingham, is celebrating its 50th anniversary in November. It was established by John R. Prewitt Jr. as J.R. Prewitt & Associates in 1974.

ServisFirst Bank, of Birmingham, has earned the statewide co-endorsement by the Texas Bankers Association for the Agent Credit Card program.

For a third consecutive year, the City of Tuscaloosa Farmers Market has been voted the Best Farmers Market in Alabama in the 2024 America’s Farmers Market Celebration Awards.

The University of Montevallo’s Communication Studies Program has been chosen to receive the 2024 Rex Mix Program of Excellence Award, presented by the National Communication Association. This is the second time UM has earned the award.

WBHM 90.3 and Gulf States Newsroom have been presented an Edward R. Murrow Award by Radio Television Digital News Association. This is the third Murrow Award for WBHM, but the first for Gulf States Newsroom.

NOVEMBER Higher Ed Boosts Alabama Economy Exceptional Educators Commercial Real Estate: Finding the Right Space Geographic Spotlight: Cullman, Walker & Winston Counties

DECEMBER Alabama Trade Goes Global Developing the Alabama Economy Generous Alabama Best Companies to Work For Geographic Spotlight: Tallapoosa & Chambers Counties Check BusinessAlabama.com for daily business headlines and additional content

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October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 81

RETROSPECT

President Warren G. Harding and his party rode through Birmingham in a specially made, all-white Premocar in October 1921. Photos courtesy of Birmingham, Alabama, Public Library Archives.

ROAD TRIP

The rise and fall of the Preston Motors Corp. Premocar

By SCOTTY E. KIRKLAND

O

One of the earliest attempts to manufacture automobiles in Alabama came in 1919 with the creation of the Preston Motors Corp. in Birmingham. The luxury vehicles made a splash on the local business scene and played a part in commemorating Birmingham’s 50th anniversary. But the car company’s fall was more sensational than its rise.

Its namesake was Preston Orr. The Tennessee native arrived in Montgomery in 1914 and lent his name to several unsuccessful business efforts, including the Non-Erasable Ink Co. and the Pep-To-Lac Bottling Co. In 1917, he relocated to the Magic City determined to build an automobile factory. Two years later, Orr announced the creation of the Preston Motors Corp., with $1 million in capital stock and plans

82 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

Preston Motors Corp. executives riding in a Premocar at the company’s plant.

to build a large factory in North Birmingham. Orr served as secretary and treasurer.

Two key members of the company had Detroit car-making roots — its president, R. A. Skinner, and sales manager, the

appropriately named James T. Driver.

The company’s first demonstration model was a four-cylinder soft top called the Preston, to be sold for $600.

As plant construction began, Skinner expressed confidence in their endeavor. There was “no reason in the world” Birmingham could not produce cheaper cars than other parts of the country. All of the raw materials were close at hand. Locals espoused similar faith in the company, purchasing a reported $500,000 in early public stock, most a few dollars at a time.

The economical Preston never went into production.

By the time the plant opened, the company had shifted gears to an automo-

R E T RO S PE C T

bile with more luxurious furnishings and a new name: The Premocar. It sat on a steel frame with a carriage body made of kiln-dried wood and iron joints. The car sported a six-cylinder engine and a three-speed manual transmission.

No expense was spared. The Premocars featured the best available battery, gears and wheels, along with a Klaxon horn Silent-movie star Doraldina at the with its unmistakable Preston Motors Corp. plant.

“AHH-OOH-GAH” sound. Maroon with cream-colored tires was the festivities, they were met at the train standard, eye-catching color. station by a specially made Premocar. It Eventually, six different models were was painted white and sported a white, made, including several touring cars, a kid-leather interior. “I wondered then coupe, sedan, roadster and even a truck. what on earth would become of the The cost of a standard Premocar was beautiful all-white car,” one observer later a steep $1,295 (about $21,000 today), recalled. “Birmingham back then was a more than double the price for Ford’s smoke-laden city. Plenty of soot.” basic Model T. Still, executives hoped But there was no soot to be seen on local pride would override price concerns. that anniversary day. Like the vehicle that James T. Driver announced that the first paraded the president through the streets, six months’ worth of inventory was preBirmingham was clean and glistening. sold.

A crowd of 100,000 lined the parade As production sped along, praise route. After his speech at Capitol Park, poured in from beyond the Magic City. the president and his party were treated A Tulsa dealer pronounced the Premocar to a Premocar-powered tour of the city. the “best buy on the automobile market Thereafter, the white vehicle sat in the today.” A Florida enthusiast on a threePreston Motors showroom and was used state road trip reported his Premocar on occasion to ferry important guests averaged a whopping 18 miles per gallon. about the Magic City.

Sales gimmicks, yes, the Premocar had Then, in the spring of the company’s a few. Engineers tested the vehicles along fourth year, everything went wrong — the curves and hills of Oxmoor Road stunningly, quickly and perhaps even on Shades Mountain. A racing version criminally wrong. Despite initial zeal, of the Premocar broke a speed record despite impressive public stock purchases at the Birmingham Fairgrounds track, and despite presidential publicity, Preston clocking a 54-second mile. A few months Motors was losing ground. Orders did not later, famed dancer and silent-movie star keep pace. Costs soared. Parts suppliers Doraldina was photographed balancing went unpaid. In March 1923, several atop a running Premocar’s radiator cap, a New York-based creditors sued in federal means of demonstrating the car’s smooth court for a combined indebtedness of engine. $8,000. Legal proceedings revealed PresThe Premocar played a key role in ton’s unmet bills to be far higher, nearly the Oct. 26, 1921, commemoration of $200,000.

Birmingham’s 50th anniversary. When The Birmingham car company was President Warren G. Harding and First thrown into involuntary bankruptcy and Lady Florence Harding arrived for the saddled with a court-appointed receiver to

settle debts.

Though Preston Motors executives initially planned to fight the receivership, they soon reversed course. Whatever public confidence remained in the company vanished.

Soon the state came calling for its pound of Premocar flesh. The Alabama Securities Commission and attorney general secured almost two-dozen indictments against Orr, Skinner and Driver for violations of the state’s “Blue Sky” law, which protected investors from fraudulent activities.

The indictment included a cold accounting of the company’s troubled history. Over the past four years, the company produced fewer than 450 Premocars. Only seven of 38 dealerships received all the models they purchased. A second stock offering in 1922, announced as an effort to expand the business, was actually used to pay down debts totaling nearly half a million dollars. Purchasers of those bad stocks included some 650 Jefferson County residents, none of whom was compensated in the bankruptcy proceedings.

Imprecision written into Alabama’s rambling “Blue Sky” law kept Preston Motors executives out of jail. Released of their indictments, they promptly left the Yellowhammer State never to return. The next session of the Alabama Legislature strengthened the laws overseeing public securities. The saga of Preston Motors, called “the most sensational bankruptcy case” of 1923, was at an end.

The Holcombe Textile Equipment Co. purchased the sprawling Vanderbilt Road plant that once built Premocars. Despite a 1926 fire, most of the structure still stands. Today, it houses a multi-tenant manufacturing and wholesale facility.

No Premocars are known to still exist.

Historian Scotty E. Kirkland is a freelance contributor to Business Alabama. He lives in Wetumpka.

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 83

Index Adams, Mae..................................................................86 AE Industrial Partners................................. 53, 55 AE Shoals Manufacturing & Technology Center....7 Ainsworth, Lt. Gov. Will.................................................31 Airbus Group....................................................31 Alabama A&M University....................................7 Alabama Bankers Association...........................35 Alabama Banking School............................ 35, 67 Alabama Capital Network.................................67 Alabama Clean Fuels Coalition........................6, 7 Alabama Community College Conference..........65 Alabama Community College System............6, 67 Alabama Court Appointed Special Advocates.....67 Alabama Department of Commerce...............6, 31 Alabama Elk River Development Authority........67 Alabama Fiber Network....................................86 Alabama Film Office...........................................6 Alabama Forestry Commission............................6 Alabama Historical Commission........................71 Alabama Independent Insurance Agents.......9, 86 Alabama Launchpad...........................................9 Alabama Leadership Initiative.................... 35, 67 Alabama League of Municipalities....................67 Alabama Legislature................................... 35, 82 Alabama Mountain Lakes Tourist Association.....67 Alabama Music Hall of Fame....................... 67, 71 Alabama Port Authority......................................9 Alabama Power Co..............................................7 Alabama Renaissance Faire...............................71 Alabama School of Healthcare Sciences.............86 Alabama Securities Commission.......................82 Alabama Sports Council....................................35 Alabama State Bar............................................12 Alabama State Employees Association.................6 Alabama State Tourism.....................................55 Alabama State University..................................86 Alabama Youth Sports Alliance..........................35 Aldridge Borden...............................................81 All Star Auto Parts...............................................9 Allen, Chris...................................................................35 Alliance for American Manufacturing................10 Alliance Sand...................................................55 Alpha Delta Pi Sorority......................................35 Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority..............................35 Alpha Phi Alpha...............................................67 Alves, Victor..................................................................86 Amazon.com Inc...............................................49 American Bankers Association..........................67 American College of Cardiology.................. 59, 81 American Cruise Lines......................................69 American Legions Boys State.............................35 American Metals Chemical Corp........................55 Ames, Austin...................................................................6 Anderson, Brittney........................................................86 Anderson, Dalton..........................................................35 Andrews, James...........................................................49 Anglin Reichmann Armstrong PC......................81 APM Terminals...................................................9 Arlington Properties...........................................9 Arts Alive, Florence...........................................71 Association for Biblical Higher Education...........65 Association for Financial Professionals..............35 Association of Women in Metal Industries.........67 Astroport Space Technologies............................27 Athens State University....................................35 Atlantic Sun Conference....................................65 Auburn Housing Authority...............................35 Auburn University................................ 35, 67, 81 Auburn University Montgomery.......................35 Austal USA.....................................................7, 8 Autauga Education Foundation.........................35 B.R. Williams LTL Logistics..................................8 B.R. Williams Trucking........................................8 Babe Ruth League World Series.........................69 Bacchus, Lacey..............................................................86 Baez, Joan....................................................................71

A guide to businesses (bold) and individuals (light) mentioned in this month’s issue of Business Alabama.

Balch, Eason.................................................................35 Balch, Elizabeth............................................................35 Baldwin County Commission..............................6 Baldwin County Economic Development Alliance....................................6 Ballard, Jason...............................................................27 Bank Independent.................... 35, 55, 67, 69, 86 Battle, Tommy...............................................................31 BBB Industries...................................................9 BBVA S.A.........................................................35 Belle Mont Mansion, Tuscumbia........................71 Benchmark Automotive......................................8 Bentley, Mark.................................................................6 Berry, Kandi..................................................................86 Besco Steel Supply.............................................9 Betterton, Andrew..................................................67, 69 Bezos, Jeff.....................................................................27 Big Brothers Big Sisters.............................. 35, 67 Binion, Bruner..............................................................35 Bird, Michael................................................................86 Birmingham Monday Morning Quarterback Club.........................................35 Birmingham Water Works..................................7 Birmingham-Southern College.........................67 Black, Tim.....................................................................86 Blair, David...................................................................86 Blalock, Rob....................................................................6 Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Alabama.............59 Blue Origin Enterprises LP................................27 BMS LLC...........................................................81 Bradley Arent Boult Cummings LLP...................86 Branch, Beth...................................................................9 Brasfield & Gorrie...............................................6 Bridgeman, Meghann....................................................6 Britt, Sen. Katie.............................................................31 Brock, Skip Sr................................................................49 Brown, James...............................................................71 Brown, Ken...................................................................35 Bryant Bank.....................................................35 Bryant, Brenda..............................................................69 Buchanan, Kyrel............................................................67 Buffett, Jimmy..............................................................71 Burritt, David..................................................................6 Burroughs, Sandra Killen.............................................67 Bush Creek Park, Waterloo................................69 Byars Wright......................................................9 Byrd, Anna....................................................................49 Calmar Community Center, Montgomery............8 Cane Creek Canyon Nature Preserve..................71 Cannabis Law Report........................................86 Captrust Financial Advisors...............................20 Carr Riggs Ingram............................................81 CB&S Bank.......................................................35 CBS Broadcasting Inc........................................27 Centennial Thoracic Surgical Associates, Nashville....................................67 Central Alabama Community College..................7 CFD Research....................................................31 Charles Theatre, Montgomery...........................87 Cheaha State Park..............................................7 Cherry, Chip..................................................................31 Chewy Inc........................................................49 Church of the Highlands...................................35 Churches of Christ............................................65 City of Tuscaloosa Farmers Market.....................81 ClearSky Rehabilitation Hospital.........................8 Clinton, Corky...............................................................27 Colbert County..................................... 53, 55, 69 Colbert County Tourism....................................55 Collier, Jeff......................................................................9 Colonial Bank...................................................35 Colorado School of Mines..................................27 Community Bank & Trust, Union Springs...........12 Comptroller of the Currency, Office of the..........12 Constellium N.V.................................... 53, 55, 57 Coon Dog Memorial Graveyard.........................71 Corporate Counsel Magazine............................86

84 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

Costco Wholesale Corp......................................49 Council of Fashion Designers of America...........81 Create Birmingham............................................6 Creel, Jamie..................................................................81 Creighton University........................................67 CRF Tech...........................................................67 Crow Shields Bailey PC.....................................81 CSX Corp............................................................7 Cypress Moon Studios......................................71 Dauphin Island, Town of.....................................9 Davis South Barnett and Patrick........................86 Davis, Brianna...............................................................35 Davis, Jason..................................................................35 Decatur Morgan Hospital System..................9, 12 Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc...........................67 Dent Moses LLP................................................81 Derbend Asset Management.............................20 Doraldina/Dora Saunders.............................................82 Drake State Community & Technical College......27 Driscoll, John..................................................................9 Driver, James T..............................................................82 DSI Security Services.........................................86 Duff, Haven...................................................................35 Duff, Seth......................................................................35 Dye, Allen.....................................................................35 Dye, Paige.....................................................................35 Dylan, Bob....................................................................71 Edith Newman Culver Memorial Museum.........71 Edmunson, Jennifer.....................................................27 EFP Advisors.....................................................20 Eliza Coffee Memorial Hospital.........................55 Emory University..............................................67 Environmental Protection Agency.......................7 Espy, Cameron................................................................6 Essity A.B................................................... 53, 57 EXIM/Export Import Bank of the United States...16 FAME Recording Studios...................................71 Farnborouogh Air Show....................................31 Faulkner University.................................... 35, 86 Fellowship House Inc........................................35 Fenner Melstrom & Dooling PLC........................81 Ferniany, Will................................................................86 Ficken, David................................................................86 Financial Advisor Magazine..............................20 First Citizens Bank............................................35 First Horizon Bank............................................35 First Metro Bank...............................................35 Flexco Corp. .....................................................57 Florence Indian Mound & Museum...................71 Florence-Lauderdale County Port Authority........................................ 53, 55 Florence, City of..............................53, 55, 67, 69 Forbes Magazine..............................................55 Ford Motor Co...................................................82 Ford, Bryan...................................................................16 Ford, Henry...................................................................12 Forsythe and Long Industries............................67 Foster, Casey...................................................................6 Foster, William..............................................................67 Frank Lloyd Wright Rosenbaum House..............71 Franklin, Aretha............................................................71 Frawley, Patrick.............................................................12 Freedom Hills Wildlife Management Area.........71 Freightcar America...........................................67 Friends Inc.......................................................35 Friends of Magnolia Cemetery..........................35 Frost, Andrea.................................................................35 Fulbright Scholars Program..............................65 Full Court Ministries.........................................35 Gaines Family Farmstead..................................49 Gaines, Chandler..........................................................49 Gaines, Dewar...............................................................49 Gaines, Paden...............................................................49 GE Aerospace....................................................31 Gessler, Carl..................................................................31 Girtman, Reeivice.........................................................86

Glasscock, Robby..........................................................86 Gonzales, Zachary.........................................................86 Goodwill Inc.....................................................35 Goodwin, Jeff...............................................................67 Gorrie, Jim......................................................................6 Gorrie, Miller..................................................................6 Great Southern Wood Preserving........................7 Grill, Laura....................................................................86 Growden, Dave...............................................................8 Gulf Corp...........................................................6 Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act......................7 Gulf State Park...................................................6 Gulf States Newsroom......................................81 GunRunner Boutique Hotel, Florence..................8 Habitat for Humanity.................................. 35, 67 Hall, Scott.......................................................................7 Hallmark Auto Group..........................................8 Hamilton, Allen............................................................35 Handy, W.C...................................................................53 Haney and White Enterprise...............................8 Harding, Florence.........................................................82 Harding, Pres. Warren G...............................................82 Harvard University...........................................67 Haslam, Kevin...............................................................67 Hawkins, Jack Jr.............................................................6 Health Resoures and Services Administration....59 Helen Keller Festival.........................................55 Helen Keller Hospital................................. 59, 67 Hendrix, Tom................................................................71 Heritage Christian University...................... 55, 65 HGGC LLC.........................................................20 Historic LaGrange College Site Park...................71 Holcim Elevate.................................................57 Holcombe Textile Equipment Co........................82 Holloway, Braxton........................................................67 Homewood, City of.............................................6 Honda Development and Manufacturing of Alabama LLC..................................................7 HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology............7 Hulsey, William C...........................................................9 Huntsville Hardwood Club................................35 Huntsville Hospital Health System.............. 12, 35 Huntsville International Airport........................31 Huntsville Rotary Club.....................................35 Huntsville, City of ............................................31 Huntsville/Madison County Chamber of Commerce.................................31 Hyundai Motor Manufacturing Alabama...........81 Iberiabank Corp...............................................35 Icon Technology Inc..........................................27 Inc. Magazine...............................................7, 49 Indiana University............................................67 Inside Public Accounting..................................81 International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers......................................65 Isbell, Jason..................................................................35 Isbell, Kim....................................................................35 Ivey, Gov. Kay..........................................................16, 86 Ivy Green, Tuscumbia........................................71 J.D. Power........................................................81 J.R. Prewitt & Associates...................................81 Jackson Hospital & Clinic....................................9 Jackson Thornton....................................... 35, 81 Jackson, Todd.................................................................6 James Marine Inc.............................................55 JamisonMoneyFarmer PC.................................81 Jim Wilson & Associates.....................................7 Joe Wheeler State Park.....................................71 Johnson, John..............................................................12 Jones, Michelle Forsythe..............................................67 Jones, Rob....................................................................67 Jones, Toni....................................................................86 Jordan, LaFreeda..........................................................31 Kalm Therapeutics............................................86 Kansas City Chiefs............................................67 Karr, Chuck...................................................................31 Kassouf & Co. Inc..............................................81

Keefer, Katrina..............................................................86 Keller, Helen.....................................................53, 69, 71 Kelly Natural Gas Pipeline..................................9 Kelly Road Builders............................................9 Kelly, Robert Earl............................................................9 Kennedy-Douglass Center for the Arts...............71 Kilby Laboratory School....................................81 King, Chris.............................................................. 35,67 Kiwanis International.......................................67 Kolaitis, Jimmy.............................................................86 Kratos SRE........................................................27 Lauderdale County............................... 53, 55, 69 Lauderdale County Agricultural Center........ 55, 69 Lauderdale County Schools...............................55 Lauderdale County Workforce Development Center....................................55 LaunchTech LLC..................................................7 Lawson, Lee....................................................................6 Leadership Alabama.........................................35 Leadership Mobile...........................................35 Leadership Shoals...................................... 35, 67 Lexington, Town of...........................................67 LifeSteps Financial............................................12 Limestone County Economic Development Association....................... 35, 86 Linamar Structures USA........................ 53, 57, 67 Lockhart, Mike........................................................67, 69 Looney, Josh.................................................................67 Louisiana State University................................35 Machen McChesney LLP....................................81 Macy’s Inc..........................................................8 Magic City Fashion Week Inc.............................81 Maisel, Ivan....................................................................9 Marshall Space Flight Center.............................27 Mauldin, Hallie.............................................................67 Maynard Nexsen..............................................86 Maynard, Cooper & Gale...................................35 McArthur, Mac................................................................6 McCallie School, Chattanooga...........................49 McClusky, Patrick............................................................6 McDaniel Service LLC........................................55 McShane Partners............................................20 Medical Clinic Board of the City of Montgomery.............................................9 Medical Properties Trust.....................................8 Merchants National Bank, Mobile.....................16 Merit Bank.......................................................12 Metze, Terry..................................................................86 Middle Tennessee State University....................67 Miracle Worker, The..........................................71 Mississippi State University..............................35 Mobile Airport Authority....................................8 Mobile Area Chamber of Commerce..................35 Mobile Bay Magazine.......................................35 Mobile International Airport...............................8 Mobile, Port of...............................................6, 9 Montgomery Examiner.....................................87 Montgomery, City of...........................................8 Morris, William.............................................................86 Motion Industries..............................................9 Murphy, Patrick............................................................20 Muscle Shoals Songwriters Festival...................71 Muscle Shoals Sound Studio Museum...............71 Muscle Shoals, City of......................53, 55, 67, 69 Music Preservation Society...............................67 NASA...............................................................27 National Collegiate Athletic Association....... 65, 67 National Communication Association................81 National Junior Collegiate Athletic Association......................................65 National League of Cities..................................67 National Maritime Museum, Mobile....................7 National Science Foundation.............................86 NephSol Inc........................................................9 New Mexico Highlands University.....................67 New York City Marathon...................................35 New, Rachel..................................................................35 New, Ryan.....................................................................35 Nippon Steel......................................................6

Non-Erasable Ink Co..........................................82 North Alabama Medical Center.................... 55, 59 North Alabama Shoals Hospital............. 55, 59, 67 North American Lighting...................... 53, 55, 57 Northeast Alabama Community College............86 Northwest Alabama Council of Local Governments......................................67 Northwest Alabama RC&D.................................67 Northwest Alabama Regional Airport.......... 53, 55 Northwest Shoals Community College....7, 55, 59, 65, 67, 69 Norvell, David...............................................................35 Okaloosa Gas District, Florida..............................9 Orlando Magic.................................................67 Orr, Preston...................................................................82 Osmonds, The..................................................71 Palomar Insurance...........................................86 Paris Air Show..................................................31 Partlow, Kevin...............................................................67 Partlow, Molly...............................................................67 Patterson Prince and Associates PC....................67 Paul, Scott.....................................................................10 Peek, Barbie..................................................................31 Peluso, Gabe III.............................................................35 Pennsylvania Steel Co.........................................9 Pep-To-Lac Bottling Co.......................................82 Performance Werks Racing...............................67 Peterbilt Motors Co.............................................7 Phi Theta Kappa...............................................67 Pi Kappa Phi.....................................................35 Pillsbury, Michael.........................................................86 PNC Bank.........................................................35 Pope’s Tavern & Museum..................................71 Port Alabama Industrial Center, Loxley................6 Port of Mobile................................................6, 9 Potts, Dana....................................................................12 Powers, Kelli.................................................................12 Premocar/Preston Motors Corp..........................82 President’s “E” Award for Export Service............16 Preston Motors Corp.........................................82 Prewitt Group, The............................................81 Prewitt, John R. Jr.........................................................81 Princeton Review.............................................81 ProAssurance Corp..............................................9 ProxsysRx Inc.....................................................9 Radio Television Digital News Association.........81 Raleigh, Rich.................................................................12 Rane, Jimmy...................................................................7 Rattlesnake Saloon...........................................67 Red Bay Hospital..............................................59 Redding, Otis................................................................71 Regions Bank..................................12, 16, 35, 86 Reidinger, Josh.............................................................20 Remote Shoals........................................... 53, 55 Renaissance Tower, Florence.............................71 Renasant Bank........................................... 35, 86 Retail Strategies...............................................86 Retirement Systems of Alabama.......................55 Rickman, Lisa................................................................69 Ricks, Cameron.............................................................35 Ritz Theatre, Sheffield.......................................71 River Bank & Trust............................................35 River Capital Advisors LC..................................20 River Heritage Park, Florence............................71 River Heritage Trail, Florence...................... 69, 71 Riverchase Galleria.............................................8 Riverfront Park, Sheffield.................................71 Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail.............................71 Roberts, Butch..............................................................31 Robins & Morton............................................8, 9 Rolling Stones, The...........................................71 Rotary International.........................................35 Russell, Adam...............................................................12 Russell, Justin...............................................................20 Sage Dental.......................................................9 Saleem, Muhammad....................................................86 Samz, Jeff.....................................................................86 Sanders Trust.....................................................8

Sanoa Consulting LLC.......................................67 Seefeld, Valerie.............................................................86 Seibel, Anne Marie.......................................................86 Sekas, Sean...................................................................86 ServisFirst Bank................................... 35, 81, 86 Seven Springs Lodge & Rattlesnake Saloon................................ 67, 71 Sheffield, City of......................................... 53, 69 Sherrill, Jonathan.........................................................35 Sherrill, Lacy.................................................................35 Shipbuilders Council of America.......................10 Shoal Creek Preserve........................................71 Shoals Alabama Launchpad..............................55 Shoals Business Incubator................................55 Shoals Chamber of Commerce...........................67 Shoals Economic Development Authority................... 53, 57, 67 Shoals EDA Florence AdvantageSite...................55 Shoals Industrial Development Council.............67 Shoals Metropolitan Transportation Planning Organization.................................67 Shoals Music Makers Recording Incentive... 53, 55 Shoals Storytelling Festival...............................71 Shockney, Bethany.......................................................86 Simon & Garfunkel...........................................71 Sims, Patricia................................................................27 Singhal, Sameer...........................................................31 Singin’ River Brewing Co..................................67 Skinner, R.A..................................................................82 SmartBank/Smart Financial Inc................... 35, 81 Smith Dukes & Buckalaw LLP............................81 Smith, Bob....................................................................31 Smith, Ronnie.........................................................16, 86 Southeast Pet...................................................49 Southeastern Tourism Society...........................67 Southern Association of Colleges and Schools....65 Southern Economic Development Council.........86 Southern States Bank.......................................35 Southwire Co........................................ 53, 55, 57 Space Launch System..........................................6 Spear, Rebecca..............................................................35 Spelman College..............................................67 Spring Park Light and Water Show....................71 Spring Park, Tuscumbia........................ 67, 69, 71 SSAB Americas....................................................6 Stanford University............................................9 Starnes, W. Stancil..........................................................9 Steineker, Whitt............................................................86 Stephenson, Nikki........................................................86 Steward Health Care...........................................8 Stork, Jill.......................................................................86 StrategiQ Financial Group.................................20 Strickland, Carson.........................................................16 Sullivan, Annie.............................................................71 Sumner Regional Medical Center......................67 Synovus Financial Corp.....................................35 Talladega College...............................................6 Tarkett Alabama Inc.................................... 53, 57 Te-lah-nay’s Wall..............................................71 Teledyne Brown Engineering..............................7 Teledyne Technologies Inc..................................7 Tennessee Southern Railroad............................55 Tennessee Valley Authority..............31, 55, 65, 69 Tennessee Valley Museum of Art.......................71 Terrell State Hospital, Texas................................8 Texas A&M University.......................................67 Texas Bankers Association.................................81 Thacker Casket Inc............................................57 Thomas, Jeanne...........................................................35 Thomasville Industrial Development Board.......35 Throw Like a Pro app.........................................49 Till, Angela....................................................................31 Timber Products Inspection Inc.........................12 TJ Maxx/TJX Companies Inc...............................49 Toflinski, Garett.............................................................86 Townson, Penny............................................................31 Trail of Tears............................................... 55, 71 Troy University.............................................6, 35

Trussville Area Chamber of Commerce...............35 Truszkowska, Agnieszka................................................86 Tuggle, Jeremy.............................................................35 Tuggle, Lauren..............................................................35 Tuscaloosa City Council.....................................35 Tuscumbia City Schools.....................................55 Tuscumbia Depot........................................ 55, 71 Tuscumbia, City of................................ 53, 67, 69 U.S. Army ..........................................................7 U.S. Army Corps of Engineers..............................9 U.S. Coast Guard.................................................8 U.S. Department of Energy..................................8 U.S. Navy...........................................................7 U.S. Semiquincentennial Commission.................7 U.S. Small Business Administration...................16 U.S. Steel......................................................6, 10 UAB Collat School of Business...........................20 Underwood, Billie Jo......................................................6 Underwood, Paul..........................................................67 United Athletic Conference...............................65 United Way......................................................35 Unites Steel Workers........................................10 University of Alabama .....................................35 University of Alabama A Club............................35 University of Alabama at Birmingham..... 9, 20, 35 University of Alabama in Huntsville........ 8, 31, 86 University of Colorado Health.............................8 University of Memphis.....................................67 University of Mississippi..................................35 University of Missouri-Kansas City....................67 University of Montevallo..................................81 University of North Alabama.................... 35, 53, 55, 65, 67, 69, 81 University of South Alabama.............................86 University of West Alabama..............................35 USA Health Providence Hospital........................81 USA Health University Hospital.........................81 USA Today..........................................................8 Valley National Bank........................................35 Varble, Georgia Claire...................................................35 Vertical Cold Storage..........................................8 Veterans Park, Florence....................................69 Viegas, Tacey.................................................................86 Virginia Transportation ......................................7 Vogue Magazine..............................................81 W.C. Handy Music Festival.......................... 55, 71 Wall Street Journal.............................................6 Ward, Mike...................................................................31 Warren Averett Asset Management...................20 Warren Averett CPAs & Advisors.................. 20, 81 Warren, Mike................................................................86 Washburn University........................................67 Waverly Advisors LLC........................................20 Wayne State College.........................................67 WBHM 90.3 Radio............................................81 Wealth Partners Capital Group..........................20 West Morgan High School, Trinity......................35 West Village, Florence................................ 55, 69 Western Governors University..........................67 Whitesell Corp.................................................57 Wilkins Miller LLC............................................81 Williams, Lisa................................................................35 Williams, Roger............................................................67 Williams, Ronnie..........................................................12 Willman, Brian..............................................................86 Wise Alloys......................................................71 Wise, Michael...............................................................86 Wittenborn, Hunter........................................................8 Womble Bond Dickson......................................12 Womble, Hill................................................................12 Woodall Grain Co..............................................55 Wright, Frank Lloyd......................................................55 Wright, Haig II................................................................9 WRM Group.......................................................9 Wyatt, Alex......................................................................6 Yuma Regional Medical Center, Arizona...............9 Zone Products....................................................9

October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 85

Career Notes GARETT TOFLINSKI

SEAN SEKAS

VICTOR ALVES

KANDI BERRY

by ERICA JOINER WEST

Faulkner University has hired Robby Glasscock as director of bands and Michael Bird as assistant director of bands.

MAE ADAMS

Gov. Kay Ivey has appointed the following to the Alabama School of Healthcare Sciences board: Reeivice Girtman, Katrina Keefer, Laura Grill, Jill Stork, Jeff Samz, Dr. Will Ferniany, Mike Warren and Dr. Brittney Anderson.

Northeast Alabama Community College has named Jimmy Kolaitis its athletic director.

RONNIE SMITH

MICHAEL BIRD

BRIAN WILLMAN

JIMMY KOLAITIS

NIKKI STEPHENSON MUHAMMAD SALEEM

DAVID BLAIR

AGNIESZKA TRUSZKOWSKA

ROBBY GLASSCOCK

TONI JONES

The University of South Alabama has named David Blair to lead its new Office of Military Services.

Agnieszka Truszkowska, an assistant professor in the College of Engineering at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, has won the 2024 Oak Ridge Associated Universities Ralph E. Powe Junior Faculty Award.

INSURANCE Toni Jones, of Palomar Insurance, has been named Young Agent of the Year by the Alabama Independent Insurance Agents.

TIM BLACK

DAVID FICKEN

ZACHARY GONZALES VALERIE SEEFELD

ADVERTISING Garett Toflinski and Sean Sekas have joined Davis South Barnette and Patrick.

Toflinski will serve as a digital and marketing strategist, while Sekas will serve as digital art director.

BANKING Victor Alves, of Bank Independent, has graduated from the bank’s Campus to Career professional development program and has been promoted to a credit analyst at the bank.

Renasant, of Decatur, has promoted Kandi Berry to vice president. She also is the branch manager for the Stratford Road location.

Mae Adams has been promoted to vice president, private banking officer for ServisFirst Bank Huntsville region.

Ronnie Smith, head of the corporate banking group at Regions Bank, will retire at the end of 2024. Brian Willman, head 86 | BusinessAlabama.com October 2024

MICHAEL WISE

of commercial banking, will succeed Smith. Nikki Stephenson, head of credit products, will be promoted to head of commercial banking.

BIOTECH Kalm Therapeutics, of Huntsville, has appointed Tacey Viegas as chief development officer.

ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT Bethany Shockney, of Limestone County Economic Development Association, and Lacey Bacchus, of Retail Strategies, will represent Alabama on the Southern Economic Development Council board.

EDUCATION The National Science Foundation has awarded a $500,000 grant to Alabama State University Professor Muhammad Saleem, in the Department of Biological Sciences, for his research on microbial ecosystem ecology.

INTERNET The Alabama Fiber Network, a coalition of electric cooperatives and partners responsible for deploying middle-mile infrastructure statewide, has named Terry Metze as its inaugural CEO. Others hired for the network are Tim Black, David Ficken, Zachary Gonzales, Valerie Seefeld and Michael Wise.

LAW Anne Marie Seibel, a partner in Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP, has received a 2024 Women, Influence & Power in Law Award in the Collaborative Leadership category from Corporate Counsel. In addition, Partner Whitt Steineker has been named to the 2024-25 Global Top 200 Cannabis Lawyers list published by Cannabis Law Report.

Maynard Nexsen has added Michael Pillsbury as a shareholder in the Government Solutions practice group.

SECURITY William Morris has been named general counsel of DSI Security Services of Dothan.

Historic Alabama

EXTRA, EXTRA ...

This 1955 photo includes several elements that are no longer around. First, the crowd gathered in front of the Charles Theatre is a group of paper boys for the Montgomery Examiner. The Montgomery Examiner is no more, and paper boys like the ones in the photo are few and far between. And then there’s the Charles Theatre, which opened in 1940 and closed in March 1974. Photo courtesy of the Alabama Department of Archives & History.

Do you have a photo you’d like us to consider for Historic Alabama? Send it to Erica West at ewest@pmtpublishing.com.

Alabiz Quiz

Challenge yourself with these puzzlers from past issues of Business Alabama magazine. Beginning Oct. 21, work the quiz online and check your answers at businessalabama.com.

October 2024:

October 2023 (one year ago):

October 2014 (10 years ago):

Q: Birmingham-based Gaines Family Farmstead has developed a line of products suitable for an animal often found on farms. What kind of animal?

A) Chicken B) Cow C) Dog D) Pig

Q: BA featured an update on a $1.1 million project underway in McCalla. The plant, slated to open this year, will be devoted to a food product called Uncrustables. What company?

A) Kraft Foods B) J.M. Smucker C) Coca-Cola D) Procter & Gamble

Q: We talked with Virginia Barnes, a Huntsville native overseeing the Space Launch System, a massive project for Boeing. What’s the target destination for the Space Launch System?

A) Jupiter B) Mars C) The moon D) Venus

October 2019 (five years ago):

October 1999 (25 years ago):

Q: Our lead news item was a progress report on a major construction project. It had 2,500 construction workers, 1,600 steel beams, 26,000 tons of steel and ranked — according to Twitter — as the largest industrial project in Alabama and among the top 10 in the country. And it was slated to open in 2021.

What plant?

A) Airbus in Mobile B) Hyundai in Montgomery C) FreightCar America in the Shoals D) Mazda Toyota in Limestone County

Q: Our CEO Q&A for October featured Edward E. Lucente, who was brought in from IBM to try to rescue the finances of a Mobile born-and-bred printer manufacturer. What company? Hint: One of the founders went on to serve 16 years as mayor of Mobile.

A) Brother B) Hewlett Packard C) QMS D) Xante

September 2024 (one month ago): Q: Magneco/Metrel opened in Gadsden in a plant that once housed Gulf States Steel. The Illinoisbased Magneco/Metrel makes refractory products for iron, steel, aluminum and glass making. What do you use a refractory product for?

A) Melting things B) Shaping things C) Sharpening things D) Smoothing things

Answers from September: B, C, C, B, C, A October 2024 BusinessAlabama.com | 87