Expansions ahead for Sarris, sports apparel firm
Courtesy of Sarris Candies
Sarris Candies president Bill Sarris expects the company’s new production facility, in the old Fort Pitt Bridge Works building, to be operational in 2024.
Courtesy of Pennsylvania Coal Alliance
Iron Senergy’s Emerald Mine in Jefferson Township is an award winner.
Replica jerseys of former Los Angeles Lakers star Anthony Davis are shown being processed at Stahls’ German Township facility in this 2019 file photo.
Observer-Reporter
That production facility the operators of Sarris Candies had planned to build had become, well, a production. Supply chain delays and other backups have taken their sweet time to sort out, forcing the brass at the iconic specialty chocolates and candies store to hold off on plans they developed a little more than two years ago.
Construction at a once-shuttered Canonsburg plant may not be imminent, but the project has taken a positive turn, according to Bill Sarris, the company president. “We’re moving along as a whole,” he said recently.
Sarris, the son of founder Frank Sarris, estimates that “we’ll start to move production equipment in there the first of April. We hope to be up and running in September and start letting people in to take tours by November.”
Cramped for space at its lone location – the candy store/ice cream parlor at 511 Adams Ave. – Sarris officials decided to move production and packaging from there to another structure. For that purpose, in August 2021, they purchased a 130,000-square-foot industrial building, known locally as “the old Fort Pitt Bridge Works.” That building, which Sarris said had been updated, sits at 135 Meadow Lane, about a mile away in the borough.
“We need production space,” Sarris said at that time. “This will give us a chance to be a lot more efficient, and move product better. It’s more logistics than anything.”
As for the current location, he said: “The products won’t change, and the candy store and ice cream parlor will stay the same.”
Stahls
An upcoming celebratory ribbon cutting will fit a Fayette County business to a T.
Stahls Decorating Fulfillment Center, a sports apparel manufacturer in German Township, has scheduled the event for Oct. 12. It will mark an expansion of the facilities at 1 Paisley Industrial Park, which is located on a hill near Masontown, the Monongahela River and Carmichaels.
An open house will run from 11 to 11:30 a.m. Make-a-shirt and building tours will be from 11 a.m. to noon.
Stahls is a heavy print technology company that makes personalized athletic gear. The firm, which has been in existence since 1932, is based in Sterling Heights, Mich. It has locations nationwide – including ones in Cumberland Township and Uniontown, which serve other functions.
Coal
The companies that own two Greene County mines are among the winners of the Pennsylvania Coal Alliance’s PA annual mine safety and reclamation awards.
Iron Senergy, the Louisville, Ky.-based owner of Emerald Deep Mine in Jefferson Township, received the PCA’s Best Overall Reclamation Award. Reclamation awards, according to a news release, “honor companies that exceed federal and state regulations to reclaim former mining operations into land with environmentally sound conditions and productive uses.”
Consol Pennsylvania Coal Co. LLC, headquartered at Southpointe, won a Keystone Mine Safety award in the Longwall category at Harvey Mine, located in Sycamore. These awards go “to member companies to recognize outstanding safety records,” based on data retrieved from the U.S. Department of Labor’s Mine Safety and Health Administration and Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
Harvey Mine had 630,857 man-hours of operation last year with a non-fatal day lost rate of 0.63.
Owners of mines in Somerset, Indiana and Lycoming counties also won awards.
Hiring event
Live! Casino Pittsburgh has scheduled a hiring event for Monday at its location in Westmoreland Mall, Hempfield Township.
The event will take place from 2 to 7 p.m. at the casino’s event space on the second floor, 5260 Route 30, Greensburg.
Applicants will meet directly with hiring managers and learn more about the open positions. The casino said it is seeking candidates “in all facets of operations.”
To pre-register, send an email to: WMLrecruitmentteam@livech.com.
Gift to AHN
Allegheny Health Network has announced it has received a $250,000 gift that will support four programs across AHN’s Medicine Institute, Neuroscience Institute and Cardiovascular Institute. AHN said in a news release that “the programs aim to foster diversity among health-care providers, promote health equity across our region and support medical education for tomorrow’s caregivers.”
The gift came from Western Pennsylvania natives Terry and Janet Serafini.
A significant amount of the funding will support the “TRIUMPHS” program within the AHN Medicine Institute. TRIUMPHS is a mentorship program and collaboration among the AHN Internal Medicine Residency Program, Pittsburgh Public Schools and Highmark Health.