A home town Collingwood boy has come to the rescue of the former Barber Glass plant.  Richard Wilson has purchased the plant and will re-open the operation as “Collingwood Glass.”  The former Barber Glass plant had fallen into receivership and the future looked grim for the 50 or so plant employees.  Now, thanks to Wilson and his investment partner, Gordon Tozer who resides in Caledon, the future is very bright.

Wilson said the deal to purchase the glass plant happened very quickly and went right down to the wire.  “It came down to the very last day.  We had a meeting at about 11 o’clock the night before where they kept pushing and as far as I was concerned it was a dead deal, but we made one last effort the next day and it all came together at the last moment.  Fortunately we were able to keep the business in Collingwood.” Wilson worked with Tillie MacDonald and her team at the Centre for Business and Economic Development along with town councillor Joe Gardhouse to beat the deadlines that would have made the deal impossible to complete.

The Centre for Business set up an action group to deal with the receivership and sale of the former Barber Glass assets. Group members are Dr. Martin Oosterveld, Chair of the Board, Tillie MacDonald, General Manager, Mel Walker an industrialist, and Joe Gardhouse, council member Town of Collingwood. The group was able to attract an investor who competed for the original bid to the receiver but his plan to run the company was not accepted.

The action group was initially very discouraged when the receiver appointed Danbury Services to auction off the plant. Shortly after that announcement in February a partner in the auction, GMR Belgium came to Collingwood. The owner Johan Coenen was retained for his world recognized expertise in the glass business. Fortunately he recognized that the plant was worth more if it was kept intact and he set out to try to attract a buyer for the entire package.

Mr. Coenen described the plant as a ‘pearl’ and stated that a bankruptcy of this calibre only comes along once in a lifetime. The plant is capable of producing tempered, laminated and insulated glass to a maximum size of 130in.x240in. There is no other plant in North America that can match this jumbo glass capacity. Only two plants come close, one is located in the US and another in Mexico. All architects who design iconic buildings will want to use this product.

The comments by the expert for the sellers encouraged the action team to work as hard as possible to find investors willing to take the risk of buying the plant. Over a period of 2 months Mel Walker used his extensive network of contacts to find prospects. Johan Coenen made many contacts through his glass industry data base. Several times it appeared that an agreement was close, only to see hopes dashed at the last minute by some complication. Along the way there was huge and constant pressure from Danbury Services who wanted to see a sale completed as fast as possible.