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6A I DAWSON COUNTY NEWS I dawsonnews.com
Wednesday, January 15,2020
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706-216-0992
103 Industrial Park Road,
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706-216-2362
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Suite 100 Dawsonville
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alidat our Shelter, PetSmart and Petco
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706-265-9160 | 633 Martin Road, Dawsonville
adjacent to the Rock Creek Sports Complex
FROM 1A
Furniture
“They were about a
half-an-hour apart from
each other,” said
Heilman. “One was
where we did all the
building and the wood
working and the other
shop was where we did
the finishing, where we
stained it and put the
coatings on top of the
wood to protect it and
make a finished piece of
furniture, which meant
that every single piece of
furniture had to leave one
shop and go to the other
shop, which was very
cumbersome and expen
sive, and we risked dam
age from bouncing it on a
truck. It just became more
difficult to conduct busi
ness, so we knew we had
to look elsewhere.”
“The first obvious place
we looked was North
Carolina,” Heilman
added.
North Carolina, espe
cially the western part of
the state, has long been a
hub for the furniture
industry, both in terms of
having a huge amount of
generational woodwork
ing talent in the work
force and because one of
the leading industry trade
shows is located in High
Point, N.C.
“It’s kind of like a fur
niture capital,” said
Heilman. “But we got the
feeling that it was sort of
like a corporate headquar
ter sort of place, with a
lot of warehousing of
imported items that got
repaired and shipped out,
but we’re very much
about ‘Made in America,’
and wanted to still be
handmade and build our
own furniture, not go buy
it from a manufacturer
that we don’t have control
over that’s overseas.
That’s very much a part
of who we are.”
Heilman also wanted to
look in New Jersey, as
real estate and warehouse
facilities are much cheap
er without being too far
removed from their birth
place.
But Heilman’s wife,
Brianne, had a lot of fam
ily in the area of
Cleveland, Georgia, and
the couple had been com
ing down with their
daughter to visit for
years. The two loved the
area and loved the idea of
being close to family, so
they decided to begin the
location search in north
Georgia.
Because of the history
of manufacturing, cabi
netmaking and other arti
san trades, Hellman-
Chang felt like they could
attract the talent they
needed to attract in this
part of the state.
While the company
originally looked at seven
different counties in north
Georgia, they eventually
settled on Dawson as
their new home.
“Dawson County has a
lot of attractive qualities,”
said Heilman, “but I think
the community and the
growth really stuck out to
JANUARY SPECIAL!
•it We are welcoming the Hew Year with a bit of a treat!
Adoption fees will be the same as the outside
temperature!
^Temperature will be determined by
weatherchannel.com.
Photos by Jessica Taylor Dawson County News
Above: Employees of Hellman-Chang's new
Dawsonville manufacturing facility. Right: Dan
Heilman reviews plans for a nightstand on the
production floor of Hellman-Chang's Dawsonville
production facility.
us. It’s still considered a
rural county, but you see
so much going on with
the 400 corridor.”
Another thing that real
ly stood out to Heilman
and Chang was Betsy
McGriff, Director of
Economic Development
at the Development
Authority of Dawson
County.
“Betsy McGriff was
just really helpful early
on. Very responsive, very
organized getting the
answers to questions
about zoning and permits
and all sorts of things, not
to mention she was just
very eager to have manu
facturing come to the
county.”
The company eventual
ly landed on a space near
the intersection of Ga.
400 and Hwy. 53, in a
32,000-sq.-ft. building.
In Dawson County,
Hellman-Chang now has
an abundance of space.
With all the new square
footage, the company
decided to hire a consul
tant to help them set up
and organize their pro
duction line, allowing for
multiple pieces to be built
at once and increasing the
speed at which they can
meet their clients’ needs.
“The physical space is
more conducive to doing
business,” said Heilman.
“It’s a little more than
double the space. . . . We
think it will allow us to
increase our production
tenfold as our company
grows over the next 10,
15 years.”
In addition to Heilman
and his family, two other
employees relocated their
families to Dawson
County from Brooklyn.
One was Jejeda, the
master finisher in charge
of turning the built pieces
into modern masterpiec
es. Heilman describes the
day that Jejeda told him
he would move with him
to Georgia as a day full of
tears.
“(Heilman) told me that
he was moving to
Georgia, and I said ‘if
you move, I move with
you,”’ Jejeda said.
“Jejeda’s been actually
working with us for 10
years. He would have
been a really difficult per
son to lose. He’s training
our new finishers now,”
said Heilman. “He used
to drive an hour and a
half to get to the shop in
Brooklyn. Now he’s nine
minutes away.”
The other was Kenon
Perry, a six-year veteran
with Hellman-Chang.
“The biggest change
was the amount of room
we have here,” said Perry.
“We could buy some
more specialized machin
ery in order to make the
process faster, and we
also have more room,
which allows us to have
more raw materials on
hand.”
“And if you’re going to
move to New Jersey, you
may as well move to
north Georgia,” Perry
added. “The people are a
lot nicer here.”
The company has not
fully said goodbye to
Brooklyn. While the man
ufacturing is now taking
place here in Dawson
County, the company
does maintain a small
office where co-founder
Eric Chang runs the team
responsible for sales,
design and marketing.
But Hellman-Chang is
all-in on Dawson County.
Indeed, on a large banner
hanging in the production
facility and on the back of
every one of the team’s
shirts, the company acro-
nym mantra of
UNRIVALED is spelled
out, outlining all of the
values that make
Hellman-Chang great.
The last of these val
ues? The D stands for
‘We are Dawsonville.’
“We took this opportu
nity to move not just to
find more space. We
could have done that in
New Jersey, right across
the river,” said Heilman.
“We wanted to not just
move but to take an
opportunity to turn a
whole leaf over and take
a look at our business. A
full 360 review of the
business and look for
opportunities to make
improvements to what we
were doing in the past.
And one big thing was
culture. . . . We have a lot
of these core values that
we’ve said we were going
to build right from the
start. We really want to
ingrain ourselves in the
community.
“We think here, we’re
going to be able to
thrive.”
2020 DAWSON COUNTY BOARD OF ASSESSORS MEETING
SCHEDULE
The Board of Assessors of Dawson County shall
conduct regular meetings on the dates set forth at the
Dawson County Government Center Conference
Georgia. The meetings shall begin at 8:30am.
Room 1213 located at 25 Justice Way, Dawsonville,
Board of Assessors Meeting Dates
January
01/14/2020
February
02/04/2020
March
03/03/2020
April
04/14/2020
May
05/05/2020
June
06/09/2020
July
07/07/2020
August
08/11/2020
September
09/08/2020
October
10/13/2020
November
11/03/2020
December
12/08/2020
