Mississippi Laminators: Little Mill, Big Impact

Shubuta, Mississippi, may not be a large town, but it’s home to the largest employer for miles around: Mississippi Laminators. At the time of this 2015 interview, the family-run business was the only lamination mill in the state and one of only a handful in the Southeast.

“There’s two in Alabama, one in Georgia, and two in Arkansas,” owner Charles Clark explained.

Humble Beginnings

The company had a modest start. “My father and his partner started Mississippi Laminators in 1966,” Clark explained. “He had worked for the Anthonys. They hired him after they had just started their laminated beam factory. He worked there for a couple of years and got it to where it was profitable and said, ‘You know, if I can do this for them, I can do it myself.’”

Clark continued, “So he and his partner, Mr. Poovey, started up Mississippi Laminators: Mr. Poovey ran the place and Daddy was the controlling accountant. It was a two- or three-man operation for a couple of years. It gradually grew by word of mouth and Daddy driving around and calling on people. Now we’ve got about 35 employees.”

“We make laminated beams primarily for the residential market,” Clark explained.

And business was booming. “We’ve done more business in the last two years than we’ve done in the history of the company,” said Clark. “We’ve done over $5 million in sales the last two years.”

“Most of our business goes west and north. Texas and Pennsylvania are big customers. We’ve shipped products into Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma, North and South Carolina, Tennessee, Maryland and some of the Eastern Pennsylvania business includes New York, too.”

Like any wood products operation, though, the mill has its challenges. Mississippi Laminators had a bad week right before we spoke. “Yeah, we broke down,” Clark admitted. “We burned up a shaper-loader and that pretty well knocked us in the head for what we were trying to do all week. Had to put new bearings in it and this is a small place, no bearings around, so we had to get them flown in.”

Harnessing Technology

When the company got into wood lamination, it was a learning experience. “We got an RF [radio frequency] machine and we found out that we needed a moisture meter, so that’s where Wagner comes in,” Clark said. “We had to pull wet lumber out, so we had to get the electronic stuff.”

“We’ve been using some kind of Wagner Meters’ products with various upgrades for about 35 years,” Clark said.

“We’ve been using the Apex system for a long time,” Clark explained. “We generally try to keep the moisture content to 17%. The only trouble we’ve had has been with humidity. We have a kiln that will hold 40-50,000 board feet and we’ll leave it in there for 36 hours to get it down to about 15% when we take it out. We don’t want to over-dry it. We run it back through the moisture meter a second time and hopefully we won’t have to put it back in the kiln a second time.”

Although the Apex system had worked reliably for a long time, Mississippi Laminators was planning to upgrade to the Omega In-Line Moisture Measurement System. Omega can use up to eight sensors in its sideways configuration, and its end-to-end configuration scans at more than 300 measurements per second. Its data can also be sent to automated lumber grading systems for additional moisture information. Optional Omega data collection and analysis software helps track down problems in the production process.

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“We’ve got a handheld meter we also use to spot check things throughout the plant. If you come in Monday and it rained Saturday and you’ve got no idea what got wet, the handheld can check moisture content before it goes through the planer,” he added.

Mississippi Laminators continues to expand its horizons. “We’ve got plans to move machinery around so that we can do 60′ beams,” Clark said. “Right now we can do 52′. That will open up some markets that we don’t have. We need to get a more diversified source of buyers.”

Wagner Meters systems have helped even a small mill like Mississippi Laminators compete with much larger operations. To find out how Wagner can help your mill, call us at (800) 505-1409.

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Tony Morgan

Tony Morgan is a senior technician for Wagner Meters, where he serves on a team for product testing, development, and also customer service and training for moisture measurement products. Along with 19 years field experience for a number of electronics companies, Tony holds a B.A. in Management and his AAS in Electronics Technology.

Last updated on October 9th, 2026