150 manufacturing jobs are coming to Sussex County

There is a new manufacturing company coming to Georgetown: Great Outdoors Cottages, maker of recreational cabin parts, will open an office and manufacturing plant this fall in the Delaware Coastal Business Park off Delaware Route 9, Delaware Business Times reports.

The company, which plans to lease out seven acres of land for 30 years to build a 45,000-square-foot warehouse, will be the fourth company in the rural business park. The parts it will manufacture will be sold to campgrounds up and down the East Coast.

“We felt Georgetown was a good, central location from the Carolinas and New England and it was a great deal for the land,” Great Outdoor Cottages CFO John Longino told the Business Times. “We didn’t want to be landlocked, so we have the capability to expand our footprint as we grow as well.”

When the office and plant open around October, it’s expected they will hire 50 employees, with an additional 100 employees added over the next two years.

Delaware Coastal Business Park is owned by Sussex County, which spent $2.2 million to add 74 acres to expand the former Sussex County Industrial Park in 2017 in order to draw more manufacturing companies to Georgetown. Other tenants so far are plastics manufacturer Atlantis Industries, lighting company JAYKAL LED Solutions and flooring material manufacturer DGS Properties. Other companies that are planning to move there include Builder Supply of Delmarva and PATS Aircraft.

Today, manufacturing is the state’s second-largest traded sector after agriculture, boasting 44,000 jobs with an average salary of $60,000. For more on First State manufacturing, check out our Manufacturing in Delaware series.