Longaberger Effort to Buy U.S.-Made Pottery Hits a Snag

Longaberger Co. is making alternative plans to obtain pottery after word came this week that the U.S. supplier it chose in the spring is shutting down.

The interim measures, however, mean that the Newark-based basket and decor company will source some of its goods from abroad, a departure from a recent buy-American initiative.

Niagara Ceramics, Longaberger’s Buffalo, N.Y., pottery supplier, filed notice on Monday with New York state’s Labor Department announcing that it will close, putting 110 employees out of work.

The move comes only a few months after a ribbon-cutting ceremony at the 300,000-square-foot facility that was to be known as Longaberger Pottery Works. The ceremony, on May 20, was to be one of the first steps toward Longaberger’s goal of selling only U.S.-made pottery.

The closing of the Buffalo facility comes as it was “just in the early stages” of manufacturing pottery, Longaberger spokesman Russell Mack said. The plant had yet to produce much.

Longaberger announced in 2012 that it would focus on returning to U.S.-made products in a strategy known as Project Eagle. The company’s pottery line — Longaberger Woven Traditions Pottery — was launched in 1992 and was made by suppliers in the United States until 2005, when pottery-making was moved abroad.

At the time that President and CEO Tami Longaberger announced the Buffalo partnership, company officials said it was possible that Longaberger would make pottery at its campus in Dresden in Muskingum County.

The availability of the Dresden facility means the Buffalo closing shouldn’t be hard for Longaberger to handle, said retail consultant Chris Boring, principal of Boulevard Strategies.

“I can’t imagine it would be that difficult to find another supplier,” Boring said. “Muskingum County has always been a hotbed of pottery. There’s really no reason they can’t set up pottery-making right here in Ohio.”

The closing could indeed mean more work for Ohio, Mack said, “because as we continue our ongoing search for the best ways to obtain the pottery our customers want, one of the options could be setting up our own facility here at our Ohio location at some point. We continue to look at that as an option.”

Mack said: “We always knew this transition to 100 percent American-made would take time. Tami said a year ago when she announced it that it would take three to five years and that there would be bumps along the way, but that it would be worth it, and we would get there as fast as we possibly can.”

Longaberger initially expected to make about 1 million pieces a year at the Buffalo plant.

Longaberger is switching to “alternative suppliers, both in the U.S. and internationally sourced,” to fill orders, Mack said. “We are also talking with the potential new owner of that Buffalo plant, so there are possibilities there as well.”