Springs Industries

Springs Global Participações S.A.

Type	Sociedade Anônima
Traded as	BM&F Bovespa: SGPS3
Industry	Textile
Founded	2005
Headquarters	Montes Claros, Brazil
Key people	Josué Christiano Gomes da Silva, (Chairman & CEO)
Revenue	US$ 820.8 million (2012)
Net income	- US$ 70.3 million (2012)
Number of employees	3,980
Parent	Coteminas
Website	www.springs.com

Springs Global is a Brazil-based multinational corporation engaged in the manufacturing, marketing, and sale of packaged textile and non-textile home furnishings. It makes textile goods, such as sheets, pillows, bedspreads, towels and bath rugs, under the Springmaid and Wamsutta brands. Other well-known brands from Springs Global include Regal, Beaulieu, Bali, and Nanik. It operates in Argentina, Mexico, Brazil, Canada and the U.S. and has about 30 manufacturing units in 13 states of the U.S.

The previous owner, Springs Industries, combined its home textile operations with Brazil's Coteminas, and the main manufacturing operations were moved to South America from Lancaster County, South Carolina, where the original plant had provided jobs for nearly one-third of the county's population. After the relocation of manufacturing to Brazil, the resulting structure left the renamed Springs Global US to work alongside Coteminas as the operating units of parent Springs Global; most manufacturing decisions and control originate from the Montes Claros headquarters, while executive control is in the U.S.

In 1887, Samuel Elliott White and others started Fort Mill Manufacturing Co. in Fort Mill, South Carolina. The plant opened in 1888. At one time, the plant employed 2000 and was the largest producer of fabric for bed sheets in the world, but in 1983 when it closed, only 200 still worked there. The White Plant in Fort Mill opened in 1892.

In 1895, Leroy Springs and others started Lancaster Cotton Mill in Lancaster, South Carolina. Springs also bought the Chester and Cheraw Railroad, renaming it the Lancaster and Chester Railroad, or L&C. Lancaster had the largest print cloth factory in the world in 1939.

In 1948, Springs opened the Grace Plant on the Catawba River near Lancaster at the site of a former locomotive shop. The company made consumer products for the first time.

In 1959, Elliott Springs died and H.W. Close became president of The Springs Cotton Mills and Springs Mills Inc., adding new plants and products and making Springs a publicly traded company in 1966.