GAINESVILLE, Ga. — A Hall County business that opened 102 years ago is shutting its doors.%
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Channel 2's Craig Lucie went to Gainesville where he spoke with the third generation owner.
Harry Bagwell has been working in the Georgia Chair warehouse since he was a kid. His grandfather opened the business back in 1914.
The woodworking business made it through the Great Depression.
Bagwell told Lucie their biggest clients were school systems and they are not buying the quality furniture that they used to.
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"It was built on the fact of a good quality product, and that’s what we hung our hat on to make a good quality product for people," said Bagwell.
But the lingering effects of the recent recession hit their major clients like metro area and nationwide school systems.%
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"We make tables, chairs, and media centers for libraries," said Bagwell.
Bagwell says school systems started cutting costs.
"The economy has pushed schools to buy less expensive furniture because their budgets are smaller. They had to make adjustments just like everybody else," said Bagwell.
Bagwell told Lucie that he will miss it when customers come in and tell him the chairs that their grandparents used are still being passed down through generations.
"They tell you about the rockers, the kid sets or whatever. It's a great testament to something that we make every day," said Bagwell.
Bagwell says his decades-old woodworking machines, which still operate like new, are heading to the auction block.
He says he worries about manufacturing companies in the US, but says he and his employees will carry on and leave the dust behind.
"It's hard. I've been doing this for 33 years. It's a hard thing to stop, but times change and you have to change with them," said Bagwell.
Bagwell says he hopes someone will by their 5.5 acre property and make it a mixed-use development with a brewery to preserve the old woodworking feel.
Cox Media Group
