American Starlinger-Sahm hosts grand opening of US HQ

American Starlinger-Sahm Inc celebrated the official opening of the new US headquarters in Fountain Inn, in the Greenville Metropolitan area, South Carolina, with a two-day Open House.

The inauguration ceremony of the new 23,000ft² facility was held on the evening of 23 September 2015 and attended by the mayor of Fountain Inn, Gary Long, as well as the Director of Fountain Inn Administration, Eddie Case, Gary Smith, member of the South Carolina State House of Representatives, and important players in the US and plastics and recycling industry. Chantal Fryer, director of Recycling Market Development with the South Carolina Department of Commerce, spoke during the ribbon cuttting ceremony during the open house. In total, around 140 customers from more than 65 companies from the US, Canada, Mexico and South America were in attendance.

Promising future
Angelika Huemer, Managing Partner of the parent company Starlinger & Co. GmbH, emphasised the importance of the North American market for the Austrian-based supplier of woven packaging production equipment and plastics recycling and refining equipment. “In the past years we witnessed a continuous rise in the demand of our machinery on the North American market”, she said.

“Our subsidiary Sahm already has a long established presence as a supplier of winding technology to the American textile sector, and with the growing plastics recycling industry Starlinger recycling lines are experiencing strong demand.” Angelika Huemer also sees great potential in the woven plastic packaging sector, especially with the new technology for PET tape fabric the company recently developed. “For Starlinger, the opening of our new headquarters in Fountain Inn is one further step into a promising future on the American market”, she concludes.

Jimmy Cranford, President of American Starlinger-Sahm, Inc, considers the new technical centre and show room an important investment. “We can now present the newest technology from Starlinger and Sahm in the United States to our existing and potential customers.”

The programme for the Open House included presentations of the newest technological developments by Georg Sahm GmbH & Co. KG and the textile packaging, recycling technology and viscotec divisions of Starlinger. In the new showroom visitors could see the latest Sahm winder models, a recoSTAR universal recycling line, and a viscoSHEET PET sheet line in operation.