CANTAR/POLYAIR Plant wades deeper into pool

The company aims to boost Jacuzzi's pool businesses, which it purchased.
By DON SHILLING
VINDICATOR BUSINESS EDITOR
YOUNGSTOWN -- A Youngstown plant is preparing to expand its offices and staff after its parent company bought the largest brand of above-ground swimming pools in North America.
Cantar/Polyair, located in the Performance Place Industrial Park off Poland Avenue, will add an undetermined number of employees for sales, marketing and customer service, said Gary Crandall, president of the company's Cantar division.
Staff additions are coming because Cantar/Polyair announced this week that it bought pool-related assets from the Florida conglomerate that owns Jacuzzi. The Youngstown plant is the headquarters for Cantar, the company's pool division.
Cantar/Polyair, which employed about 1,000 people at 10 plants in the United States and Canada before the acquisition, is owned by Polyair Inter Pack, a public company based in Canada.
Expansion?
Crandall said he intends to increase sales of the Jacuzzi businesses that were acquired by at least 20 percent a year.
That could lead to an expansion of the Youngstown plant, which employs 190, Crandall said. Officials have identified ways to more than double the plant's size, but no decision has been made, he said. The company still is looking at how to integrate the new businesses.
One new business coming on board is Atlantic pools, which is the biggest above-ground pool brand and a division that makes pumps and filters under the Jacuzzi name. U.S. Industries, which owns the Jacuzzi name, retained its whirlpool and bath division.
Crandall said U.S. Industries has been losing money on its swimming pool business, but Cantar/Polyair has identified areas where it can contain manufacturing costs and reduce overhead.
One of these is a 40-year-old plant in Arkansas, which Jacuzzi still owns. The use of that plant will be evaluated because of its age, Crandall said.
Cantar/Polyair will take over operations at other plants in Montreal and Toronto. The acquired plants employ 220.
About the deal
The company is paying $41 million for the pool businesses, including cash, and allowing U.S. Industries to buy about 599,000 shares of stock in the parent company at $8.35 a share, which is nearly $2 a share higher than it has been trading. The stock was at $2.35 a share in January 2002.
Crandall said the acquisition makes sense for Cantar/Polyair because it wants to be first or second in all of its business lines. It had been No. 12 in above-ground pools with its Summer Fun brand.
The deal adds about $55 million in annual sales, which will give Cantar/Polyair about $180 million in sales.
It also will balance the company's sales evenly between pool products and packaging. Only about one-third of sales are in pool products, even though that's how the company got its start.
Crandall said the company started making bubble packaging in 1988 because equipment that made pool covers with bubbles weren't busy for the entire year. The business exploded and the company added foam packaging.
The Youngstown plant makes thin foam used to wrap various products that are shipped. It also is the only Cantar/Polyair plant to make pool liners and safety covers.
shilling@vindy.com