Lexington Homes
opening plant
Approximately 60 people will be hired

BY LISA UZZLE GATES
DBJ Contributing Writer

2000 was not a good year for manufacturing in Holmes County. Fleetwood Homes and two other manufacturers of mobile homes shut down their production facilities and left for good. These large plants have all stood vacant until a recent announcement by Lexington Homes Inc., that they have bought the old Fleetwood factory and are currently renovating it. Lexington Home’s facility is scheduled to begin operation by mid-October.

Lexington Homes will employ around 60 people when it opens and plans are to have 100 plus employees by the first of the year. Lexington Homes will manufacture single section, multi-section, and modular homes from 768 square feet to 2128 square feet of living space. The company’s goal is to begin production at a rate of 3 units per day.

Many Holmes County citizens have worked hard to bring a mobile home manufacturer back to Lexington. Don Barrett of Lexington has worked behind the scenes for several years to help make this a reality. On Thursday, July 22, Barrett invited the Holmes County Board of Supervisors, the Lexington mayor and board of aldermen, members of the Holmes County Economic Development Authority, and other elected officials to a meeting officially announcing that Lexington Homes Inc. would open a mobile home plant in Lexington.

Barrett begin by speaking of the ill effects plant closings had caused for Holmes County. He said “I have been working for the past two years trying to help bring a mobile home industry to Lexington. I talked with Matt Riley and I found out he had the same dream.

“We soon discovered that if we were going to have another mobile home plant in Lexington, we were going to have to do something to help ourselves. With Matt’s help, we began talking with people in the industry about starting a mobile home plant in Lexington. Today, we believe we have put together the best management and sales team, probably in the country, that will operate a mobile home plant in Lexington.”

Barrett continued “With local funding, we have purchased the old Fleetwood plant number one property and we are beginning immediately the process of getting the building prepared for the production of mobile homes. The name of the business is Lexington Homes, Inc. We chose this name because of the excellent reputation that the Fleetwood Homes plant in Lexington had with their dealers for building quality products over the past 30 years.”

Barrett next introduced the three men joining with Matt Riley in forming the management team of Lexington Homes. These men are: Harold D. Weaver, Mike Sullivan, and Gene J. Rogers. All three men have been most recently employed by Cappaert Manufactured Housing in Vicksburg.

Tessie Brock of the Lexington Economic Development Authority stated “Lexington Homes has perhaps the best management team in the country. These four men are definitely four of the best around and I believe they will be very successful in this new operation. We in Lexington are thrilled by this plant opening and hope it leads to more investment in the near future.”

Harold D. Weaver will serve as Lexington Homes, Inc. as president and plant manager. Weaver has over 30 years of production and management experience.

Mike Sullivan has worked in sales with Cappaert Manufactured Housing. As Southeast Zone manager, he was personally responsible for annual sales averaging $16 million.

Gene Rogers has served as southwest zone manager at Cappaert since 1995. He produced average annual sales in excess of $15 million for the years 1995-2000. During the current economic downswing, he continued to produce over $10 million in sales.

Matt Riley is a native of Lexington and former district sales manager at Fleetwood Homes in Lexington from 1997-2001. He was responsible for sales, marketing, and distribution of manufactured homes to retail sales centers in the southeast. DBJ