Huntwood Industries Inc., the big Spokane Valley-based cabinet maker, has decided to build a massive new manufacturing facility in Liberty Lake that will allow it to quadruple its production volume in coming years.


Tim Hunt, chief executive officer and president of Huntwood Industries, says that site work for the planned 490,000-square-foot facility is set to begin later this month, and construction is scheduled to start in March. The facility could be completed in the summer of 2005, he says.


Huntwoods building plans have been much anticipated.


Hunt had said this spring that the company was looking for a site for a possible new manufacturing plant, and Agilent Technologies Inc. announced earlier this fall that it had sold 67 acres of vacant land at its Liberty Lake complex to Hunt Family Properties LLC, in which Tim Hunt is involved. Until now, however, Hunt has declined to disclose details about the project or to say for certain that Huntwood would build a plant and move from its current location in the Spokane Business & Industrial Park.


Now, he says, Weve made a commitment to the future. Its an investment in the future for our management and our employees.


Huntwood currently occupies three buildings with a total of 360,000 square feet of floor space in the Spokane Business & Industrial Park. It employs about 650 people there and has another 60 workers at sales and service branches in the Seattle area, Northern California, Oregon, Arizona, and Hawaii, Hunt says.


Huntwood has hired Haskins Co., of Spokane, as the design-build contractor for the new manufacturing facility, and the two companies are in the final stages of designing the structure, Hunt says. Project costs could be between $10 million and $15 million, although theyre not completely firmed up yet, Hunt says. He declines to elaborate on what all that expense range might include.


The facility and surface parking, which is to include roughly 900 slots, would take up just over two-thirds of the 67-acre site, which is located at the southeast corner of Appleway Avenue and Molter Road, just across Molter from Telect Inc.s operations. The facility itself would be hugebig enough to contain 8 1/2 football fields. Huntwood plans to keep the additional land for future expansion.


Hunt declines to disclose Huntwoods annual revenues. He says, however, that the company currently makes an average of 1,100 cabinets a day, or roughly enough to furnish 75 kitchens. By the time the company reaches full capacity in the new buildingin seven to 10 years at current growth projectionsit will be making enough cabinets in an average day for about 300 kitchens.


Hunt and his wife Resa, who is the companys vice president, had researched the idea of Huntwood developing its own manufacturing facility for more than six years, Tim Hunt says, and had looked at a number of sites throughout the Inland Northwest, including several sites in Kootenai County.


The couple seriously considered moving the company to North Idaho, but opted to stay in the Spokane area to retain its established employees, the bulk of whom live in the Spokane area.


Even though doing business is a little more difficult here, we felt all things considered we wanted to stay located in Washington, Hunt says.


He says that before committing to build in Liberty Lake, he talked to his friend Bill Williams Jr., founder and chairman of Telect, a telecommunications-equipment maker that started in the Spokane Business & Industrial Park in 1982 and moved to Liberty Lake in 1989.


Williams says he told Hunt about the positive business climate in the city of Liberty Lake, which incorporated in 2000. Williams advocated the incorporation.


Williams says hes glad that Huntwood has decided to become a neighbor.


Its an industry that is in effect creating wealth in the community, which we need, he says. Its a positive contribution to the community in many ways.


The Hunts started Huntwood Industries in 1988. Using a variety of woods, the company makes cabinets that are installed in kitchens, dining areas, offices, and entertainment rooms, as well as bathroom vanities.


About 85 percent of Huntwoods products are sold in the Western U.S., including in Alaska and Hawaii, Hunt says.