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Vermont Tubbs sale deal signed
May 7, 2003
(from the Front Page section Rutland Herald)
By ED BARNA Herald Correspondent
BRANDON — A group of investors led by William Meub of Rutland is seeking to buy Vermont Tubbs Furniture, with help from the Vermont Economic Progress Council.
“We are still waiting for a bank loan,” Meub said Wednesday. “We signed a new purchase-and-sales agreement two days ago.”
In February, VEPC agreed to provide the new management with $712,680 in tax credits over five years. That was contingent on the sale taking place and the money being invested to create more jobs at the Brandon furniture plant, Meub said.
He will meet with VEPC again Friday. The tax credit agreement will have to be changed because of changes in the sale proposal since February, he said, but there should not be any problem with getting the tax credits approved.
Meub, an attorney and former candidate for Congress, declined to say how many investors are part of the consortium. More may become involved, he said, but they already have the key core members.
“They are all Vermonters,” he said.
In past interviews, Tubbs’ owner William Carris and president Lee Houston have said the company was for sale and had several prospective buyers.
Carris is also the president of Carris Reels in Rutland, a manufacturer of wooden reels for the wire, rope and cable industries.
Houston said he had been brought in this past year to improve the plant’s productivity and assure the company’s viability for potential sale, but bringing the factory to its full potential would require investment in new equipment.
Houston had said the fact that there were several potential buyers was itself encouraging. The economic downturn, coupled with competition from the Chinese, who now account for 40 percent of U.S. furniture sales, resulted in many furniture companies going out of business, he said.
Carris and Houston could not be reached for comment Wednesday.
Tubbs has focused on producing lines of high-end hardwood furniture, particularly bedroom sets, using their own designs and those of contracted industry designers.
Before the economic slide, these had been very successful, bringing plant employment to around 250.
Earlier this spring, there had been 154 employees.
Rumors of Tubbs’ closing have periodically swept through Brandon.
Meub said that in an effort to save a key Vermont company, his son Morgan Meub, who has a master’s degree in business administration, had provided invaluable assistance.
A resident of Texas, Morgan Meub has temporarily come to Vermont, where he prepared the VEPC tax credit application and a financial analysis for the possible sale, his father said.
Under the present purchase and sales agreement, the group has until June 10 to obtain financing, Meub said. Assuming that comes through, the closing is tentatively scheduled for July 15, he said.
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