Dalton, Ga., may be the carpet capital, but Chattanooga is home to the tufting equipment makers upon which much of the industry has grown.
The world’s three biggest carpet equipment makers – Tuftco, Card-Monroe and Cobble Tufting Machine Co. – are headquartered in the Chattanooga area from which machines are shipped around the world.
The global reach of such companies has traditionally helped buffet domestic business cycles. But industry leaders say the worldwide recession in the past couple of years has cut both U.S. and export sales.
“There is no doubt that 2009 was probably the most challenging year that all the equipment manufacturers that were supplying the carpet industry ever had,” said Steve Frost, president of Tuftco Corp. “But you take those times and you try to be prudent and invest heavily in R&D to come up with improvements in the processes and equipment so that when the rebound does occur you can ride the rebound in a better way.”
Mr. Frost and others in the industry say they are beginning to see signs of that rebound, although they remain cautious about predicting any major turnaround. In Tuftco’s Hotzclaw Avenue plant, workers are building tufting machines for carpet makers in a half dozen countries. The company has sold machines to manufacturers in 40 countries, Mr. Frost said.