CHARLESTON, W.Va. –Procter & Gamble’s new Tabler Station facility in the Eastern Panhandle unveiled the products that will be manufactured at the plant Wednesday at the State Capitol.
The plant, which will employ several hundred residents, will make popular items such as Old Spice soap, Pantene shampoos and conditioners and Bounce fabric enhancer.
Gov. Earl Tomblin and State Commerce Secretary Keith Burdette were on hand for a ceremony with the products in a shopping cart. Burdette said the items shown Wednesday were just a starting point.
“This is kind of round one. They’re busy trying to identify what they will produce in the plant,” said Burdette. “I think they’re preparing their final plans to submit for the building permits. They’ve put in place a fairly aggressive timeline to get it up and running and in production.
Tomblin said there were a few reasons that P&G picked Martinsburg to build the facility, including its location along the I-81 corridor.
“There’s about three or four good things that we know that we’ve got going for us: taxes, our fiscal responsibility, our workforce and training programs and geographic location,” said Tomblin.
The biggest aspect of the new plant was the jobs it will create in West Virginia, Burdette said.
“The big deal is for the people who will ultimately be employed there,” he said. “This is a minimum of 700 jobs with an international company of world renown; I think the 5th largest manufacturer of consumer goods in the world. It’s a huge deal.”
Tomblin said the new plant will be the first P&G facility built on U.S. soil in a few decades.
“I think it’s a great opportunity for us. Procter and Gamble is a worldwide company, and the fact that they haven’t build a plant here in the U.S. since the 70’s and then chose West Virginia is very positive for us,” he said.
Ground was broken for the new facility last September. In addition to the 700 permanent jobs, 1,000 temporary jobs were also created.
The company released the following list of products and their expected production dates Thursday:
Late 2017:
Bounce fabric enhancers
Late 2018:
Shampoos and conditioners:
Pantene
Head & Shoulders
Aussie
Herbal Essences
Vidal Sassoon
Personal cleansing (body wash) products:
Olay
Old Spice