Today we visited textile company Glen Raven, Inc. Glen Raven is a family-owned and still currently a family run business, though as we learned today that is about to change for the first time in company history. Glen raven was established in 1880 by John Q. Gant, as a fabric company. At this time Glen Raven is separated into three different divisions: Custom Fabrics Worldwide, Technical Fabrics Worldwide, and Trivantage. At this time they sell their fabrics in a 120 different countries, while employing 2,700 people around the world. Glen Ravens mission is to “Enhance life for global consumers with the world’s most innovative fabric-based, market-driven solutions. Glen Raven has six key values which are Engaged Associates, Embracing Change, Profitable Growth, Delighted Customers, Honorable Stewardship, Confident Shareholders. Glen Ravens’ core message to its employees right now is to “Let Endless Possibilities Begin”. It is interesting that this is their message because of how in the 90’s Glen Raven had a lot of success producing professional sports jerseys but they had realized that that business was starting to go overseas where costs were cheaper. This resulted in Glen Raven embracing change and ending that business in pursuit of the Automotive industry and didn’t turn a profit for two years while trying to get into the industry, but it has since turned out to be a very profitable endeavor for them. They have also recently expanded into making fabric for the coal-mining industry to help pump clean air into the mines.
The Business structure of Glen Raven definitely seemed a lot more interesting than that of LabCorp. With the way that they embrace change and are pioneers in innovation that they will be able to survive for another hundred years if not more. It also interesting to note how after visiting both Glen Raven and LabCorp which are both large global companies that so much of what they do is logistics.

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Today the class visited the Glen Raven Company in Glen Raven, NC. The visit was very informative and we learned about all aspects of their business. From the manufacturing to the marketing, we learned everything there is to know about Glen Raven. They are a dying and finishing fabric company that specializes in automotive, military, and protective equipment fabrics. They are a global textile company that has manufacturing plants in China, Brazil, and India. The unique thing about Glen Raven is that they uphold all their manufacturing factories to the American regulations for safety and environmental protection. The company is family owned and has been for years. The same family has been running the company for 4 generations, which was started by John Q. Gant in 1880. The upcoming CEO will be the first non-Gant family member to run the company since its inception.

A major vision of the company is to “let endless possibilities begin” meaning that innovation and free thought are highly valued. The board members invest heavily in Research and Development, to create strong brands to help customers make money. The mission of the company is to enhance the lives of the global consumers. The company has a reputation for embracing change. For example, the company used to be involved in manufacturing textiles for NFL jerseys, but made a major shift to manufacturing fabrics for headboards in the automotive industry. The shift happened because Glen Raven places a large value on market research. Their employees are encouraged to be free thinking individuals who embrace change.

Glen Raven has over 27,000 employees worldwide and produces fabrics for many different purposes. The company makes textiles for mining, the military, and the automotive industry amongst others. They have many different brands that are marketed through various avenues like social media and websites. We met president Lambert’s daughter who had some very interesting words about the marketing process. They use email marketing techniques and create interesting content for consumers. She said that the marketing Glen Raven does call surveys to keep themselves informed on their audience, but follows all of the US spam laws, We got a chance to see the textiles they produce in the manufacturing part of the facility. The machines they use have a focus on safety but also efficiency.

We got to see the office side of the plant and the factory. The office side had great synergy and it seemed like the employees work very well together. Glen Raven basically has three separate companies in one. The manufacturing part of the company is called Sombrella, the most popular brand within Glen Raven, with around 22k likes on Facebook. The distributing/logistics facet of the company is called TriVantage. They handle the shipping of all of the textiles and fabrics that go around the world. Lastly there is the tech fabrics part of the company. The last speaker we heard worked in tech fabrics, a section known for its high flexibility and ability to adapt to new industries / business. When Glen Raven first got involved in the automotive industry they had to do 2 years of automotive research, looking for partners and potential clients. Eventually, they found a solid partner and made strides towards new business and success.

In terms of the vision and plans for the future, Glen Raven provided us with a brochure that lays out the vision, mission, and values. The values include; engaged associates, embracing change, and profitable growth. I can definitely see the company continuing its track record of success and new industries.

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Today’s visit to Glen Raven, a fabric manufacturing and marketing company, proved to be very informational. The company was originally founded in 1880 by John Quinton Gant and is currently headed by his grandson, Allen Erwin Gant Jr. It is really admirable that the company remains owned and managed by Gant’s descendants. Plus, Glen Raven was one of the first mills in the south to dye fabrics. In the 1960s, Glen Raven introduced its Sunbrella brand of performance fabrics, which includes fabric for awnings, furniture, marine applications, and convertible tops. This brand has been extremely successful for nearly 50 years.

Striving for success, Glen Raven has a clear vision: “Let Endless Possibilites Begin”. Its mission is to enhance life for global customers with the world’s most innovative fabric-based, market-driven solutions. Since Glen Raven is a family business, it values engaged associates who create fulfilling professional experiences through enthusiasm, focus, teamwork, diversity, creativity, innovation and a shared vision. The company wants employees who embrace change in the evolving technological, social and market forces shaping our world, and pursue the opportunities they produce. Unsurprisingly, the company wants its employees to deliver profitable growth. In doing so, the goal is to deliver products and services marked by excellence in quality and to conduct to the highest standards of ethics, safety, environmental protection, lawfulness, and respect. As a result, long-term value and customer satisfaction is almost guaranteed.

Glen Raven’s customers are typically automobile companies, the military, sailing companies, mining, and people interested in furniture and awnings. During the presentation, it was stated that Glen Raven’s products are seen in 60% of automobiles. The two companies that do not use Glen Raven’s services are Kia and Hyundai. Glen Raven’s customers value materials with a long life duration, strength, and color-hold. During the tour today, employees explained how they do tests on the fabric to determine how much weight it can hold before tearing or breaking completely. Plus, the employees told how the color team works hard to ensure that the coloring of the fabric of a seatbelt (for example) will appear to the eye as the same color of the fabric on the interior of the car after many years of different sun exposure. After today’s visit, it is very clear that Glen Raven works hard to provide customers with valuable products, and its result is just that. Many companies continue to use Glen Raven’s products and the company is recognized as the premier leader in high-performance fabric-based solutions. The companies plan is to continue to provide textiles for automobiles, the military, sailing, mining, furniture, and awnings. The goal is for Glen Raven to expand and grow annually.

Overall, I really admired the fact that some of the employees devoted so much time into market research and surveying potential customers to determine who they were and what they wanted from the company. Those at Glen Raven appear to be very smart when it comes to knowing the industry and the information needed to succeed and surpass possible competitors. This intelligence is also demonstrated by the story of how the company used to produce sport’s jerseys but soon realized that apparel would not be profitable due to price competition in China. The company changed overnight and began their endless possibilities.

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Today our class visited a textile company named Glen Raven. Glen Raven is a family-owned and run business which is also headquartered right outside of Burlington, North Carolina. Glen Raven specializes in dyeing fabrics, military equipment, and technical fabrics. The company was established in 1880 by John Q. Gant. A member of the Gant family has been in-charge of the business ever since it’s conception. However, in about four years someone will take over the business who is not a member of the Gant family and this is a very significant change to the Glen Raven business. Glen Raven sells fabrics to about a hundred and twenty different countries, while employing 2,700 people around the world with 1,700 of them being in the United States.

Glen Raven’s mission includes “enhancing life for global consumers with the world’s most innovative fabric-based, market-driven solutions.” Or in other words trying to give each of their customers around the world cutting edge fabric material to use for all different types of reasons including; automative parts, military equipment, and other. During the presentation that the Glen Raven employee gave our class she made a huge emphasis on innovation. She said that innovating and providing their customers with materials created by Glen Raven that their customers didn’t even know they needed is one of Glen Raven’s main goals. Glen Raven as a company has some specific values that all of their associates must abide by and according to the employee who gave us the presentation these values really help the company thrive. First off each associate must be engaged and come to work ready to create professional experiences through enthusiasm, creativity, innovation, teamwork, focus, diversity, and a shared vision. Also each employee needs to be able to embrace change or to be able to evolve technological and socially according to how the market is forcing our world to change. For example in the 90’s Glen Raven found their success on making professional sports jerseys like  the National Football League’s jerseys but once that business left the United States and went over seas for lower costs on making the fabrics Glen Raven had to embrace the change and find a different way to be successful. So Glen Raven turned to the automotive business and they thrive on making fabrics for the inside of every car manufactured around the world. Also they found more business in helping our military by making certain fabrics that help us in combat for the soldiers. This was an example of how Glen Raven embraced change for profit because since they lost the jersey business they had to find another way to make profit. During the presentation the women talked about how Glen Raven is committed to safety of all of its employees and the devotion to each an every employee seems to help them be very successful.

Another very interesting fact about Glen Raven is that this company is the largest producer of sailcloth fabric in the world. The other types of fabrics that Glen Raven produces is furniture and awnings in fact, Glen Raven is the market leader in awnings and casual furniture. Also the company creates ventilation curtains called MineMesh that are used in coal mines by hanging the curtains up through the entire mine to help create more air flow for the miners to breathe better. Glen Raven also finds business in geosynthetics and is also a logistical company which delivers their fabric all around the world.

The business structure of the Glen Raven business definitely seems to help their business thrive and since this business has been able to stay alive since 1880 obviously their doing something right. It seems that their devotion to innovation and to embrace change for profit has definitely helped them in the long run. The company as a whole was very interesting and seeing how the fabric was actual made and dyed was very intriguing.

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Today’s class visit was to Glen Raven, Inc., a major textile manufacturing plant located only minutes from Elon’s campus. During the presentation, we learned that the company was founded in 1880 by John Gant and has produced produced products ranging from athletic apparel and jerseys to military gear and commercial grade sails. Glen Raven is currently split into three supplementing divisions – Custom Fabrics Worldwide, Technical Fabrics Worldwide, and Trivantage. Each division handles independent aspects of the manufacturing, marketing, and logistics process, but also overlap in terms of distributing workloads and products. According to the company’s website, one of the aspects that allows Glen Raven to succeed in such a competitive market is their ability to “identify and lead niche market segments throughout history.” For example, GR was early to adopt the widespread usage of synthetic fibers. Once World War II broke out, the company was quick to help the war effort by producing high-quality parachute fabrics for utility airdrops. Today, Glen Raven’s flagship product is its Sunbrella line, which is a durable fabric originally designed to redesign the awning business and has been adopted for multiple other uses. During our visit today, multiple other fabrics were also being constructed – this included graduation gowns satin, heavy-duty felt for car interiors, and heavy laminated sheets used to redirect airflow in underground mines.

So what makes Glen Raven so successful? According to our presenters, there are multiple reasons – first, that Glen Raven is one of few companies that has retained family ownership and operation through four generations, showing a dedication to the original standards of quality and customer satisfaction set in stone by Gant over one hundred years ago. As described above, the mission and customer bases are clear – to provide high-quality textiles at competitive prices, and to effectively utilize market researchers in  order to stay on top of consumer textile trends. One presenter mentioned that at one point in time, the factory we visited was producing professional athletic jerseys until it suddenly became cheaper to manufacture the same product overseas. A conference was called, and the management essentially had to reconfigure the entire plant and its laborers in order to stay afloat.

The mission of Glen Raven is also uncomplicated and explicitly explained in catchy little pamphlets passed out to the class. “Enhancing life for global consumers with the world’s most innovative fabric-based, market-driven solutions” essentially translates into the basic principles of constant improvement of products without losing sight of customer satisfaction and product quality. With a staff consisting of both experienced executives and dedicated younger workers, Glen Raven seems to have little to no trouble accomplishing this. And although Glen Raven’s business “plan” as defined by Drucker may not be set in stone due to a consistently dynamic global economy, it seems that the company’s logistical departments seem ready to adapt to changing conditions.

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Today we visited Glen Raven for our trip. Glen Raven is a massive international corporation that was started by the Gant family. Glen Raven itself is a textile company which tends to manufacture different fabrics for use on a variety of products around the world. The mission statement says, “Enhancing life for Global consumers with the world’s most innovatice fabric-based, market driven solutions.” As a company Glen Raven is held to the highest standards and works with some of the biggest companies in the world. They have been approved by the United States government for the way they produce their products cheaply and without cutting corner, this is important to their customers because it speaks volumes about the quality of the products produced by Glen Raven. Glen Raven is an extremely successful and innovative business that satisfies its customers on all fronts. What I found to be very interesting was the structure of the business. It was described as being an umbrella with 3 different functions operating under it, the customer fabrics, Trivantage and technical fabrics. Glen Raven has developed different brands for all of the different industries it operates in and depending on what function of the umbrella is being carried out a different brand is used. When a customer buys a certain light for instance they may consider having bought it from sunbrella, the design department. Sumbrella is practically seen as it’s own company by many of its customers. Similarly when a cole mine goes to the technical fabrics department they might consider themselves to have bought from Strata Geosystems, but that does not mean it was not part of the Glen Raven company. The last division is the Trivantage. This organization sells many goods that Glen Raven does not produce on its own, and many that it does, to different customers. It is essentially a sales division. The way the company is designed is very similarly to Glen Raven being the major corporations and having many different subsidiaries to work through and with.

Another interesting part of the company was their strategy for selling products based off of their brand reputation. Instead of producing items in mass quantities the cheapest out of anybody they try to create products in which their trusted brand is what really counts. As great of a strategy as this is though it makes them need to adapt quite often. As times change so does culture and certain items become easier to replace. For example in the 90’s Glen Raven was a major manufacturer of football jerseys, but as time went on many different places would make these jerseys and so Glen Raven left that market. Glen Raven is one of the most trusted organizations in fabrics and it shows because they are able to rely on their brand name reputation to get business from around the globe.

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Ben Doster

Peter F. Drucker’s five most important questions you will ever ask about your organization are as follows: what is our mission? Who is our customer? What does the customer value? And most importantly, What is our plan? These five questions were answered today on our Glen Raven visit.  It was clear that the mission of Glen Raven was to provide high quality fabrics to both private customers and government agencies.  They produce everything from fabric used in clothing items to military grade fabric that is capable of hiding large weapons such as tanks from radar detection.

Glen Raven felt the effects of the economy when they realized that they could no longer compete with chinese labor in the business of producing cheap fabrics.  The change came when the executive team decided that in order to stay in business in the US, they would have to start producing high end items that carry a sense of quality.  This is because people are willing to pay more for these items and therefor they can produce a profit in the US.

In the Case of Glen Raven, the customers of this company demand and value high quality items that they know will stand the test of time.  This is a good business model for the company due to the fact that China can always produce the same product for less, however a mill in Burlington can always take their time and produce a much higher-quality item that they can sell for more money.

The Result of all this is a profitable company in a flied that has almost become obsolete in the recent years.  By realizing that the only way they could stay in business is to start producing goods that carry a higher sense of quality, they were able to remain as one of the only profitable mills in the area.  Due to the success of this business in the past few years, it will be interesting to see it go from a family business to more of a corporation in the next few years when the first non-family member becomes in charge of the company.  I believe that this was their way of staying up on the times and remaining a leader in their industry.  By bringing in other smart people to lead the company, new ideas will be shared and the company should continue to grow.

It is clear that Glen Raven measures its success in how much they grow and continue to expand each year.  Their products include furniture and awning fabrics, sailboat sails and fabrics for the military, and the automotive, mining and construction industries.  All of these industries mean a vast group of workers are employed there.  To deal with this, the company has strict boarders between their different departments in order to keep things moving smoothly.

Overall I really enjoyed our visit to Glen Raven.  I found it to be very interesting how they were able to save themselves by changing their business plan and better suiting the the American market.  I think the employees of this company truly enjoy their jobs.

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Glen Raven, Inc is recognized around the world as one of the premiere fabric and textile producing businesses in the textile industry. Originally founded as a simple cotton mill serving the state of North Carolina in 1880 by John Q. Gant, it has spread its business across the globe and has a 190,000 square foot factory and China and is preparing to open additional factories in Brazil as well. Since John Q Gant stepped down from his position, it has continued to be run by the Gant family after four generations as a family owned, for-profit company which is a huge reason as to why the company is so successful. The Gant family has established very high standards for the company’s services and workers which are embraced throughout the company. The company’s mission statement is “enhancing life for global consumers with the world’s most innovative fabric-based, market-driven solutions” and with this always in mind the Glen Raven produces top-quality materials for a wide range of businesses in various industries. The company is divided into three different divisions; Custom Fabrics Worldwide, Trivantage, and Technical Fabrics Worldwide, which helps the leaders of Glen Raven manage the overall company more successfully. Glen Raven is a general name for Glen Raven Inc because the entire business incorporates over one hundred twenty different companies in its daily operations and these spread all over the world. These companies are part of a wide range of services that Glen Raven performs for its customers which vary from the U.S. Military to car companies such as Ford and Honda to MineMesh which is involved in supplying mining companies material which supports tunneling operations. Despite the wide range of companies that it has to oversee, the upper-management at Glen Raven is able to efficiently maintain constant control over its operations because of themes that it stresses to its employees. The two major themes that are stressed are teamwork and creativity, because together they can provide tons of innovation and new ideas which will keep Glen Raven ahead of its competitors and on top of the markets. In addition, Glen Raven is very careful about maintaining excellent levels of sustainability by making sure it produces as little waste as possible from its factories and properly disposing of the waste that it does produce. While its factories in countries such as India and China have much lower pollution standards there than they do in the U.S., Glen Raven makes sure that they abide by U.S. standards no matter where one of their businesses is located.

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Today we visited Glen Raven where they have a strong passion for great quality product that has made them an elite company. Glen Raven is a bred of its own, where it has been owed and managed through four generations of the Grant family who originally founded the company. Now over the next four years the company will be transitioning to have it’s first none family member running the company. Glen Raven started as a company that manufactured football jerseys for the NFL and then made an overnight decision to phaseout all that and move into a whole new production of material. They now make product for automotive, filtration, mining, geosynthetics, logistics, military, protective, and outdoor. Glen Raven has solidified themselves and a company that knows exactly what they have to do to produce the best product on the market.

The mission of Glen Raven is enhancing life for global customers with the world’s most innovative fabric-based, market-driven solutions. This is easily seen by the way that have mastered their craft and  truly care about every small detail and imperfections. They follow the motto of “Let Endless Possibilities Begin” and through this they have been able to innovate new products and better existing ones so that they can give the customer s product that is absolutely the best it can be.

There are many different customers of Glen Raven, this is due to the fact that they offer so many different products. Some of the big names that do business with Glen Raven is the Military, Navy, etc. and produce the fabrics for their backpacks and the camo covers for the vehicles that render them invisible to radar that picks up heat. They also produce fabric for sailboat sails along with many other products for miners and water filtration companies.

The customer values a highly respectable company to provide them with the best quality and designed product, which is exactly what Glen Raven does. This is so important, because for example if Glen Raven does not make the perfect product for the Navy or Military all of those men and women could all be endanger and could lose their lives.

The results of Glen Raven are a high quality product for all those that they sell to. They did not just get to where they are without any work though, they take the time to inspect every roll of fabric and material to make sure there is not even one tiny imperfection in the roll.

Glen Raven has a precise plan that they carry out and that leads to their success. They have engaged associates, embrace change, are dedicated to profitable growth, they strive to please their customers in every aspect, honorable stewardship, and finally confident shareholders which are a major key to a successful operation. Glen Raven clearly has it all going on and that has led to them being a leader in their industry.

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Glen Raven was a very elaborate and extensive company from what we were told during the presentation. They have their hands in several different industries because they make and sell textiles. It’s amazing how many things in this world involve textiles, they make fabrics for the military and even make sails. The mission of Glen Raven is enhancing life for global consumers with the world’s most innovative fabric-based, market-driven solutions. They stressed the importance of flexibility and adaptation in their business because it has always given success. They used to only make textiles for clothing, but they started to branch out with new ideas for where they can create textiles for different types of things. Glen Raven is an extremely innovative business.

Glen Raven have several different customers in various types of industries. They have a global presence and have three different divisions within the company. There are almost 30 different brands within Glen Raven itself. Their customers are furniture and awning companies such as sunbrella, automotive companies, outdoors based companies such as sail making companies, protective companies such as firemen and factory workers, the military, filtration companies, mining companies, geosynthetics, and strata global companies. They serve a very diverse group of customers and are the best at making these materials. With the amount of brands that Glen Raven has and the amount of customers they serve to, it almost seems like it is monopolistic business.

The customers of Glen Raven value that the textiles being sold to them meet the needs and purpose that they will be used for. Customers value the consistency of the company as well. It is a family business, so they have been implementing the same business principles for many years now. Similar to LabCorp, they have been building on what the foundation of the company is and continuing to develop better technology, testing, and marketing techniques in order to make it more sustainable. Glen Raven is very innovative as well, which is what customers value. There is also elaborate testing that goes into the textiles before they are given to the customer so that whatever the textile or product is being used for, it will fulfill its purpose.

Glen Raven’s results is that they are a very successful company. They value flexibility and adaptation in their business environment because it has been beneficial in the past and now they have several different brands and customers. Their results are a great deal of profit because they have their hands in so many different industries that are necessary for the world to be functioning the way it should be. They make sails for ships to navigate, and make protective equipment that can withstand life-threatening situations. They also highly value profitable growth and “building a premium portfolio of businesses that return better than cost of capital, offer substantial opportunities for expansion and in which we have  a competitive advantage.” So Glen Raven’s flexibility led to growth which in the end creates a solid profit for the company.

The plan of Glen Raven is to continue to grow and keep their priorities the way they have always been. They are all about the customers that they have and being flexible in order to meet their needs. They have several different brands and are continuing to try to find different industries that need their manufacturing services. They also plan to continue to generate a large amount of profit while also staying modest and keeping the customer as their number one priority. Glen Raven also plans to continue to be an innovative company keeping an open mindset so they can jump at any profitable opportunity that may come their way.

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