BAY MINETTE – The consolidation of two furniture plants will bring around 100 new jobs to Bay Minette.

Standard Furniture will soon close the smaller facility located in Frisco City, bringing that production and most of the jobs to Baldwin County.

“The decision to idle our Frisco plant was a very difficult one,” said Standard president Todd Evans, “but one we felt necessary in order to maximize our efficiency and remain a leader in the promotional bedroom arena.

“We will be able to offer many of our displaced workers from Frisco City a transfer to our Bay Minette facility.”

Standard announced the consolidation Tuesday, but did not give a time frame for the process.

“All that is certain at this point is that the Frisco Plant will be closing July 8,” said Steve Pond, vice president of Human Resources.

Exactly when the new jobs will arrive in Bay Minette and the date when the combined operations will be fully operational in Baldwin County is not known at this time.

In April 2011, Standard Furniture began the process of converting its long time production model from a “batch system” to a “flow through” design.

Over the past 12 months, the company has become a leaner, more efficient plant. Evans said the effective manufacturing space dropped from 1 million square feet to just more than 600,000 square feet. The process reduced unnecessary movement of both workers and product, and increased the production per minute. The company also consolidated five divisions into two larger units – Manufacturing Operations and Assembly. That move will allow for the transfer of production from the Frisco plant to Bay Minette.

Standard Furniture currently builds about $55 million worth of goods per year in both plants combined. After consolidation, the more efficient Baldwin County plant will have the capacity to produce up to $70 million in product annually.

Founded in 1946, the family-owned and American-based company has close to a thousand employees domestically and overseas. As one of the largest case goods manufacturers in the United States, Standard Furniture’s product categories include bedroom, dining room, occasional tables, entertainment and youth.