The little sawmill overlooking Ebey Slough in Marysville may finally have met its end after several close calls.
International Forest Products Ltd., or Interfor, the Canadian company that bought the mill in 2004 from bankrupt Crown Pacific Partners, closed it in December.
This time, however, the lumber market wasn’t chiefly to blame. Prices for wood generally are holding steady. The framing lumber composite price calculated by Random Lengths, an Oregon-based industry newsletter, was $383 as of late January, down just $1 from the same time last year. Plywood prices are either steady or up slightly from last year.
“These are pretty good prices for lumber and panels,” said Steve Chercover, a forest products research analyst with DA Davidson &Co. who predicts prices may slightly decline as the year advances.
While closing in Marysville, Interfor is expanding its three other mills in Washington and Oregon, said Sandy Fulton, senior vice president of the company’s U.S. operations. But that wasn’t possible at the Marysville mill, which employed approximately 40 people before it closed.
Eric Fetters / The Herald ABOVE: The 40-year-old sawmill in south Marysville sits empty after closing two months ago. It was a victim of high operating costs, according to Interfor, the operation’s Canadian-based owner.
“It’s a small site, which precludes expansion,” Fulton said, adding that the mill’s size and age made it expensive to operate relative to its output.
According to Interfor, the Marysville mill could produce up to 40 million board feet a year. Typically, new softwood lumber mills are designed to produce 400 million board feet a year.
“With the dimension lumber business these days, high production seems to be the key to making it work,” said Ron Smith, general manager at Buse Timber on Smith Island in Everett.
The Marysville operation joins a long list of mills that have shut down across the region over the past two decades. But many of Snohomish County’s surviving sawmills – cumulatively employing less than 1,000 people, according to U.S. Census figures – are doing fine right now.
Within sight of the closed Interfor mill is Welco Lumber Co., where trucks are pulling in and out to pick up deliveries. The facility specializes in cedar fence posts and other cedar boards.
“We’re staying busy, and even have a lot of guys doing overtime,” said Dick Bullard, vice president and general manager at Welco’s headquarters in Shelton.
Eric Fetters / The Herald
It’s a similar story at Buse, where the employee-owned mill specializes in larger, often premium-priced beams and boards. Smith said the mill is running two shifts, as always.
“It’s been flat or up a little,” he said of demand for the mill’s products.
Even mills that produce softwood studs such as the Hampton Affiliates mill in Darrington are running full shifts. Hampton has said it has a relatively stable supply of raw lumber, another factor Interfor cited in its closure decision.
Meanwhile, at the closed Marysville mill, stacks of freshly cut lumber are gone from the parking lot. Fulton said Interfor is fielding calls from a number of companies interested in the property. Any new owner likely would have to invest to update the 40-year-old sawmill in order to make it profitable in the long term.
Reporter Eric Fetters: 425-339-3453 or fetters@heraldnet.com.
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