{"id":8508,"date":"2014-04-14T20:19:51","date_gmt":"2014-04-15T00:19:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/?p=8508"},"modified":"2014-04-14T20:19:51","modified_gmt":"2014-04-15T00:19:51","slug":"the-dead-companies-are-spinning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2014\/04\/14\/the-dead-companies-are-spinning\/","title":{"rendered":"The dead (companies) are spinning…"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today, we finally got some information from the Danville’s Economic Development office about the quite comatose GOK furniture company. I don’t believe a damned word of it.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Here’s the press release…<\/p>\n

DANVILLE, Va. \u2013 GOK International Corp. will shift its product mix at its assembly plant and showroom in Ringgold from leather sofa and chair products to outdoor furniture and commercial chairs for offices and restaurants.<\/p>\n

To allow for the transition, the Chinese-based company held a public inventory closeout sale this past weekend at its showroom, which is located in the Cane Creek Centre Industrial Park.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe agree with the company that the new product lines will be ones that can be assembled more satisfactorily in Danville,\u201d said Linwood Wright of the Danville Office of Economic Development.<\/p>\n

The restructured company also will market rugs made in China.<\/p>\n

The company currently has three employees. Those employees will remain with the company during the transition. Additional employees would be hired within 45 to 60 days, according to the company.<\/p>\n

GOK announced plans in September of 2012 to establish operations in the Danville area by investing $12.5 million to open an assembly and showcase operation at the Cane Creek Centre in Ringgold. The company expected to create 300 jobs within three years.<\/p>\n

The Virginia Tobacco Commission provided a $1 million grant to the company as an incentive to locate its operations in the area. City Manager Joe King said Monday that GOK must repay the grant if it does not meet the terms of its performance agreement.<\/p>\n

The Office of Economic Development also wants the public to know that the recently announced Zeyuan Flooring Company will proceed as planned. The restructuring of GOK International will not impact the operation of Zeyuan Flooring.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I don’t believe this one damned bit. I don’t believe that GOK will ever come close to 300 jobs in the remaining part of their 3-year agreement. I believe that the city was forced to try to put some kind of a positive spin on this GOK debacle ever since SouthsideCentral declared the company to be a Job Bust last month<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“Zeyuan Flooring Company” has taken over the lease of the GOK building in the industrial park and Linwood Wright has said that there won’t be another building constructed in the near future. So where is this Newly Reborn GOK going to produce their products? It ain’t gonna happen.
\nYou’ll also notice that there’s no statement from “Kevin” Liao, the CEO of this GOK company. If he’s out of the picture and he was the one to be the gatekeeper for this “China Strategy”, what does that say for these businesses he’s “recruited”?<\/p>\n

I’m not accusing Danville’s economic development department of any wrongdoing here as they’re trying to grasp for straw. They’re trying to spin it by making this company’s latest plans sound realistic.I’ll probably be the only one who’ll have the guts to call horsecrap.<\/p>\n

So…I’m calling horsecrap on this one. GOK will not ever be reborn as a 300-job company and this part of the “China Strategy” is a Job Bust.<\/p>\n

You heard that here at SouthsideCentral.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today, we finally got some information from the Danville’s Economic Development office about the quite comatose GOK furniture company. I don’t believe a damned word of it.<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,58,20,22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8508","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-businesscentral","category-danville","category-newscentral","category-opinioncentral","odd"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pwqFk-2de","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":8461,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2014\/03\/27\/exclusive-the-newest-job-bust-gok-industries\/","url_meta":{"origin":8508,"position":0},"title":"EXCLUSIVE: The Newest Job Bust: GOK Industries","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"March 27, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"I've been working on this story for a few weeks and I now have enough properly sourced information to publish it. GOK Industries is not going to build their Danville furniture plant and will not be creating the 300 jobs as promised in the announcement. You've heard it first on\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Breaking News"","block_context":{"text":"Breaking News","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/newscentral\/breaking-news\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12522,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2015\/04\/30\/time-machine-hows-it-going-zeyuan-flooring\/","url_meta":{"origin":8508,"position":1},"title":"Time Machine: How’s It Going, Zeyuan Flooring?","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"April 30, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Not Too Good. Let's hop in the SouthsideCentral Time Machine and go back to October 17th, 2013 where this story began. And here we are out at the Institute on October 17th, 2013 where this announcement is made... The Regional Industrial Facility Authority and the Industrial Development Authority of Danville\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Time Machine"","block_context":{"text":"Time Machine","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/featurescentral\/time-machine\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/i.imgur.com\/LSKDQcS.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/i.imgur.com\/LSKDQcS.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/i.imgur.com\/LSKDQcS.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/i.imgur.com\/LSKDQcS.jpg?resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":8524,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2014\/04\/19\/time-machine-once-twice-three-times-a-job-bust\/","url_meta":{"origin":8508,"position":2},"title":"Time Machine: Once, Twice, Three Times a Job Bust","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"April 19, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"This is a strange mashup of two SouthsideCentral types of features. We're going to hop in the Time Machine and go back to November 20, 2012. That's the day that Danville City Council approved grant money to a losing trifecta of Job Busts. Get ready for a not so fun\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "BusinessCentral"","block_context":{"text":"BusinessCentral","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/businesscentral\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"norhurst","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/norhurst.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/norhurst.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/norhurst.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":8558,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2014\/04\/29\/jeff-reed-110-halifax-county-0\/","url_meta":{"origin":8508,"position":3},"title":"Jeff Reed 110 – Halifax County 0","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"April 29, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"After looking at that scoreboard, I wonder if the Halifax County IDA is having second thoughts... Jeff Reed used to be project manager at the Halifax County Industrial Development Authority before being unceremoniously dumped. A good economic developer won't be unemployed for long and he quickly found his new spot\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "BusinessCentral"","block_context":{"text":"BusinessCentral","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/businesscentral\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10464,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2014\/10\/02\/its-payback-time-again\/","url_meta":{"origin":8508,"position":4},"title":"It’s Payback Time… Again","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"October 2, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"If you Danville taxpayers liked paying back US Green Energy's Tobacco Commission grant money, you're going to just love paying back more! We called GOK Furniture and Web Parts as Job Busts a long time ago. Now, it's official. Say goodbye to $2,000,000, folks. On Thursday, October 9th, Danville City\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "BusinessCentral"","block_context":{"text":"BusinessCentral","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/businesscentral\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"sclogo","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/sclogo.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":9509,"url":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/2014\/07\/29\/state-of-the-region-address-live\/","url_meta":{"origin":8508,"position":5},"title":"“State of the Region” Address – LIVE!","author":"SouthsideCentral","date":"July 29, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"We're LIVE! at the Institute for the Danville Pittsylvania County Chamber of Commerce's \"State of the Region\" address. Pittsylvania County Board of Supervisors Chairman Jessie Barksdale and Danville Mayor Sherman Saunders will give speeches about the progress of the region this morning. Refresh this page often for the latest happenings,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "BusinessCentral"","block_context":{"text":"BusinessCentral","link":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/category\/businesscentral\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/i.imgur.com\/AWNc4j0.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/i.imgur.com\/AWNc4j0.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/i.imgur.com\/AWNc4j0.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/i.imgur.com\/AWNc4j0.jpg?resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8508","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8508"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8508\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8509,"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8508\/revisions\/8509"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8508"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8508"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.southsidecentral.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8508"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}