WestPoint Home

Last updated
WestPoint Home
FormerlyWestPoint Manufacturing Company
TypePrivate
Industry bedding, bath
Founded1880
Headquarters New York, NY
Products bed sheets, blankets, pillows, organic cotton, bath towels, beach towels, egyptian cotton, comforters, mattress pads
Parent Icahn Enterprises
Website https://www.westpointhome.com

WestPoint Home, Inc., is a supplier of fashion and core home textile products. WestPoint Home is headquartered in New York City with manufacturing and distribution facilities in the United States and overseas. [1] [2] [3] Their products include a diverse range of home fashion textile products including: towels, fashion bedding, sheets, comforters, blankets, mattress pads, pillows and more. Some brands that they offer include: Martex, Izod, Ralph Lauren, Hanes, Stay Bright, Vellux, Patrician, Lady Pepperell, and Utica Cotton Mills. Products from Westpoint Home are found in retail stores throughout the United States.

Contents

WestPoint Home, Inc. as it is known today is the result of the mergers of three of the oldest companies in the textile industry: J.P. Stevens & Co., Inc. (est. 1813 in Massachusetts incorporated 1899), Pepperell Manufacturing Company (est. 1851 in Maine), and West Point Manufacturing Company (est. 1880 in Georgia). [4]

The company was led by the Lanier family through the late 1980s. The Laniers originally incorporated the Westpoint Manufacturing Company in 1880. [4] WestPoint Home, Inc. is now owned by Icahn Enterprises, L.P. [3]

Brands

[5]

History

WestPoint Home is a conglomerate of three textile giants. WestPoint Manufacturing Company was formed in the south shortly after the end of the Civil War. J.P. Stevens & Co. [6] and the Pepperell Manufacturing Co were two individual companies that were founded some years earlier in New England. WestPoint Home currently serves as a manufacturer of home fashion textiles. [7]

J.P. Stevens & Co had a dispute with the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers Union, a textile labor union that was founded in 1914. Crystal Lee Sutton, a mill worker at a J.P. Stevens mill in Roanoke Rapids, NC, was fired after trying to unionize employees. Sutton's firing galvanized employees, and the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers Union (ACTWU) began to represent workers at the plant on August 28, 1974. [8] The company refused to bargain with the union and, according to historian Jefferson Cowie, "embarked on a notorious war of attrition in the courts." The union won repeated court victories, but was drained of resources. A U.S. Court of Appeals found the company campaign against the union "had involved numerous unfair labor practices, including coercive interrogation, surveillance, threat of plant closing and economic reprisals for union activity." [9]

Related Research Articles

<i>Norma Rae</i> 1979 film by Martin Ritt

Norma Rae is a 1979 American drama film directed by Martin Ritt from a screenplay written by Irving Ravetch and Harriet Frank Jr. The film is based on the true story of Crystal Lee Sutton – which was told in the 1975 book Crystal Lee, a Woman of Inheritance by reporter Henry P. Leifermann of The New York Times – and stars Sally Field in the titular role. Beau Bridges, Ron Leibman, Pat Hingle, Barbara Baxley, and Gail Strickland are featured in supporting roles. The film follows Norma Rae Webster, a factory worker with little formal education in North Carolina who, after her and her co-workers' health are compromised due to poor working conditions, becomes involved in trade union activities at the textile factory where she works.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Francis Cabot Lowell</span> American businessman for whom the city of Lowell, Massachusetts is named (1775–1817)

Francis Cabot Lowell was an American businessman for whom the city of Lowell, Massachusetts, is named. He was instrumental in bringing the Industrial Revolution to the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert T. Stevens</span> American businessman (1899–1983)

Robert Ten Broeck Stevens was an American businessman and former chairman of J. P. Stevens and Company, which was one of the most established textile manufacturing plants in the US. He served as the Secretary of the Army between February 4, 1953, until July 21, 1955.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Textile Workers Union of America</span> Former trade union of the United States

The Textile Workers Union of America (TWUA) was an industrial union of textile workers established through the Congress of Industrial Organizations in 1939 and merged with the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America to become the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers Union (ACTWU) in 1976. It waged a decades-long campaign to organize J.P. Stevens and other Southern textile manufacturers that achieved some successes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Textile industry</span> Industry related to design, production and distribution of textiles.

The textile industry is primarily concerned with the design, production and distribution of textiles: yarn, cloth and clothing. The raw material may be natural, or synthetic using products of the chemical industry.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Commercial Metals Company</span> Steel and metal manufacturer

Commercial Metals Company is a steel and metal manufacturer headquartered in Irving, Texas. The company operates four divisions: Americas Recycling, Americas Mills, Americas Fabrication, and International Mill, with locations in the U.S., Europe and Asia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cannon Mills</span> American textile manufacturing company (1887–2003)

The Cannon Mills Company was an American textile manufacturing company based in Kannapolis, North Carolina, that mainly produced towels and bed sheets. Founded in 1887 by James William Cannon, by 1914 the company was the largest towel and sheets manufacturer in the world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Amoskeag Manufacturing Company</span>

The Amoskeag Manufacturing Company was a textile manufacturer which founded Manchester, New Hampshire, United States. From modest beginnings it grew throughout the 19th century into the largest cotton textile plant in the world. At its peak, Amoskeag had 17,000 employees and around 30 buildings.

Bruce S. Raynor is an American labor union executive. He is the former Executive Vice President of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), former President of Workers United, former General President of UNITE HERE, a founding member of the Leadership Council of the Change to Win Federation (CTW), and a member of the Cornell University Board of Trustees. He was Chairman of several union-affiliated national pension and insurance funds. He was Chairman of the Board of Amalgamated Life Insurance Company, a union-affiliated insurance company established in 1943. Raynor also served as chairman of the Amalgamated Bank, the only union-owned bank in the U.S., with assets of more than $4.5 billion, and as former co-chair and current member of the Council of Institutional Investors, an organization of institutional investors that control $3 trillion in pension funds. Raynor is also President of The Sidney Hillman Foundation, a foundation that supports and rewards socially conscious journalism.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cone Mills Corporation</span> American textile manufacturer

Cone Mills Corporation was an American textile manufacturing company. It produced cotton fabrics such as corduroy, flannel, and denim. The company headquartered in Greensboro, North Carolina.

Pride Group is a vertical organisation engaged in the manufacture and export of knitwear products to the European Union, the US and Canada.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cluett Peabody & Company</span> United States historic place

Cluett Peabody & Company, Inc. once headquartered in Troy, New York, was a longtime manufacturer of shirts, detachable shirt cuffs and collars, and related apparel. It is best known for its Arrow brand collars and shirts and the related Arrow Collar Man advertisements (1905–1931). It dates, with a different name, from the mid-19th century and was absorbed by Westpoint Pepperell in the 1980s. The Arrow name is still licensed to brand men's shirts and ties.

Crystal Lee Sutton was an American union organizer and advocate who gained fame in 1979 when the film Norma Rae was released, based on events related to her being fired from her job at the J.P. Stevens plant in Roanoke Rapids, North Carolina, on May 30, 1973, for "insubordination" after she copied an anti-union letter posted on the company bulletin board.

Peerless Woolen Mills was a subsidiary of Burlington Industries which maintained plants in Cleveland, Tennessee, Rossville, Georgia, and Tifton, Georgia between 1951 - 1961. Burlington Industries closed the two Georgia production sites in 1961.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lindale Mill</span>

The Lindale Mill is located in the small community of Lindale, Georgia, just outside the larger town of Rome, Floyd County, Georgia.

Springs Global is a Brazil-based multinational corporation engaged in the manufacturing, marketing, and sale of packaged textile and non-textile home furnishings. It makes textile goods, such as sheets, pillows, bedspreads, towels and bath rugs, under the Springmaid and Wamsutta brands. Other well-known brands from Springs Global include Regal, Beaulieu, Bali, and Nanik. It operates in Argentina, Mexico, Brazil, Canada and the U.S. and has about 30 manufacturing units in 13 states of the U.S.

Joseph Lanier Jr. was an American heir and businessman.

Clothing industry or garment industry summarizes the types of trade and industry along the production and value chain of clothing and garments, starting with the textile industry, embellishment using embroidery, via the fashion industry to apparel retailers up to trade with second-hand clothes and textile recycling. The producing sectors build upon a wealth of clothing technology some of which, like the loom, the cotton gin, and the sewing machine heralded industrialization not only of the previous textile manufacturing practices. Clothing industries are also known as allied industries, fashion industries, garment industries, or soft goods industries.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arvind (company)</span> Indian textile company

Arvind Limited is a textile manufacturer and the flagship company of the Lalbhai Group. Its headquarters are in Naroda, Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India, and it has units at Santej. The company manufactures cotton shirting, denim, knits and bottomweight (khaki) fabrics. It has also recently ventured into technical textiles with its Advanced Materials Division in 2011. It is India's largest denim manufacturer.

Bibb Manufacturing Company was a textile company founded in Macon, Georgia, in 1876 and was sold to Dan River in 1998. Bibb Manufacturing Company, also known as "The Bibb Company" produced cotton products such as sheets, comforters, towels, curtains, and bedspreads. Bibb Manufacturing not only provided jobs for its employees but also medical care, schools, housing, and social workers to organize clubs, trips, and other events.

References

  1. "WestPoint Home to Shutter Greenville, Ala., Facility, Textile World, February 8, 2011, 11/17/11
  2. "WestPoint Stevens to Open Shanghai Office, Receives Filing Extension", Textile World, June 2004, 11/17/11
  3. 1 2 Brent Felgner"Why Icahn Needs Westpoint", Home Textiles Today, March 6, 2008, 11/17/11
  4. 1 2 WestPoint Stevens, Inc. - Company Profile, Funding Universe, 11/17/11
  5. "Brands - Shop". www.westpointhome.com. Retrieved 2017-11-13.
  6. Minchin, Timothy J. (2006). "The Milledgeville Spy Case and the Struggle to Organize J. P. Stevens". Georgia Historical Quarterly. 90 (1): 96–122. Retrieved 15 February 2018.
  7. "WL Ross-Led Group Seeks to Acquire WestPoint Stevens", Textile World, April 2005, 11/20/11
  8. Fink, Joey (July 15, 2014). "In Good Faith: Working-Class Women, Feminism, and Religious Support in the Struggle to Organize J. P. Stevens Textile Workers in the Southern Piedmont, 1974–1980". Southern Spaces. doi: 10.18737/M7J60K . Retrieved 26 August 2014.
  9. Cowie, Jefferson (2010). Stayin' Alive: The 1970s and the Last Days of the Working Class. New York: The New Press. p. 290. ISBN   978-1-56584-875-7.