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TWST: What is International Absorbents?
Mr. Thompson: International Absorbents is a parent company of a wholly
owned operating entity named Absorption Corp. Absorption Corp. is
primarily a manufacturer of small animal products with a focus on small
animal bedding. Our primary product that we sell is called CareFRESH,
which is a small animal bedding. It's for small animals such as rodents,
birds, and reptiles. CareFRESH is the leading small animal bedding in
the pet specialty category. That is the market channel that has stores
or retail outlets that sell primarily pet products. We also sell in the
mass market, in areas like Wal-Mart and through grocery stores like
Kroger. CareFRESH is sold in several different varieties. The natural
product, which was the original, came out almost 20 years ago into the
market. A new product we have introduced is CareFRESH Ultra, which is a
white product for those people who want to know exactly when their cages
need to be changed because it's very visible. It is also quite
attractive and has excellent odor control. And the latest addition in
CareFRESH is our CareFRESH Colors. It comes in colors such as pink,
green, blue, yellow, and purple, and that has been quite a success in
the market. We also have a line of industrial products which are used
for oil spill cleanup. We haven't focused on growing that category for
about five or six years now. We focus most of our resources on animal
care products. Absorption Corp. has two production facilities. One is in
the Northwest in Bellingham, Washington, which is just north of Seattle.
And the other one is in the Southeast in Jesup, Georgia, which is down
near Savannah. On the pet side, we also have a line of cat litter. In
addition, we sell a line of small animal food called Supreme, which is
actually manufactured in England and we have a marketing agreement with
the manufacturer. We sell their product here and they sell our products
over there. International Absorbents went public almost 20 years ago. We
went public to raise the capital to build our first production plant
here in Bellingham. And then for the next 11 years, the public entity
was used to raise additional capital to basically stay in business. It
took us 11 years to become profitable, during which time we actually
went through a debenture death spiral. We survived that when the
employees and long-term investors bought out the last of the debentures
about seven years ago. At that time, the management team changed and we
have been profitable ever since. The main reason for becoming profitable
was our focusing on the animal care products. Most recently on the
capital side, three years ago, we completed the construction of a new
office warehouse facility in Ferndale, Washington, which is 10 miles
north of Bellingham. That building also has a wing where we will move
the Bellingham manufacturing facility. So the first phase of our capital
expansion was building the facility in Ferndale, and the second phase
was building our production facility down in Jesup, Georgia. That was
completed almost two years ago, and has been producing ever since.
Within the next six months, we are going to start the third phase of our
capital expansion plan, which is moving the Bellingham facility up to
the empty wing here in Ferndale. So those are the highlights (or, in
some cases, the lowlights) of our history.
Tickers included in this excerpt: IAX
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