Myrtle Beach area aviation company AvCraft hiring now as it expands

AvCraft Technical Services is hiring immediately for some of the 150 jobs the company announced Thursday that it would add in Horry County, said general manager Mike Hill.

Most of the 150 jobs promised by the local aviation maintenance and repair company are for skilled employees, such as aviation mechanics, with wages that range from $15 an hour to $26 an hour -- welcome news in a county with persistently high unemployment rates and a low average wage. The additional jobs will be support and administrative positions.

The AvCraft announcement Thursday was the first major job announcement in Horry County in years.

“The combination of the [Pittsburgh Institute of Aeronautics] coming here, the county and the state making an investment and the fact that we’re starting to have some success with our marketing of the different types of aircraft has led us to say we need to start now to build out the facility so we can bring in more work,” Hill said.

AvCraft is the first company to receive new economic development incentives from Horry County, in addition to incentives from the S.C. Department of Commerce. Horry County Council approved $100,000 in closing fund incentives for the company earlier this month, which matches the $100,000 from the state.

Most Horry County council members praised the additional jobs Thursday, but some were concerned that they didn’t know the incentive they approved was to support AvCraft, which under different ownership failed to live up to job promises it made when it came to the county in 2004.

AvCraft leases land near the Myrtle Beach International Airport from Horry County, which approved a new 10-year lease earlier this year. The company plans to use the $200,000 in incentives to make a third hangar it leases useable, Hill said.

The hangar, which is used for storage, doesn’t have heat, needs a communications system and will have to undergo some construction to build a back shop where parts can be repaired. AvCraft has to send parts out to other companies to repair them and wait for them to be shipped back, so as it expands, it wants to add an in house department that can overhaul parts, Hill said.

He said the incentives will allow the company to start those upgrades right away, with the goal of having them finished by the end of 2012, he said. The company will spend about $1 million on the improvements and expanding the business.

AvCraft has about 50 employees now, but when the new hangar is complete and if the existing hangar is fully utilized there will be a more than 100 percent increase in production, which will require the additional employees.

The company has to create 150 jobs within five years or give back the money, according to the incentive agreements. Hill said he wants to add the jobs well before that deadline.

“As it stands right now we certainly see that’s a strong possibility,” he said.

A challenge for the business in the past has been finding skilled employees, but with the Pittsburgh Institute of Aeronautics opening a new campus down the street from AvCraft next month, the company will have a pool of skilled local employees in a couple years, Hill said.

The job announcement is the first under the new leadership of the Myrtle Beach Regional Economic Development Corp., which is charged with bringing new jobs to the county.

“It’s a wonderful company that is growing,” said Brad Lofton, the CEO of the EDC. “We’re just proud. They could have located or expanded anywhere in the country... and they chose to be here in Myrtle Beach.”

The announcement also should help the EDC get the word out that Horry County is a great place to do business, especially in the aviation industry, one of the targeted sectors, he said.

“It just gives us more momentum and credibility that we are becoming an emerging hub for aviation-related jobs,” Lofton said.

The EDC created the incentives guidelines that Horry County approved earlier this year and that were used for the first time for AvCraft.

The company had to go through a thorough vetting process with the EDC and the state before receiving the incentives, Lofton said.

Several Horry County Council members said they didn’t know that AvCraft was getting money when they approved the incentives earlier this month.

County Councilman Carl Schwarzkopf said he was surprised it was AvCraft.

“Look at AvCraft’s track record,” he said. “It sure gives me second thoughts.”

County Councilman Marion Foxworth said he also didn’t know who the incentives were going to and he doesn’t think the vote would have been the same had county council known they were for AvCraft.

“AvCraft was the example used several months ago, when we started down this path, of incentives that don’t work out,” he said. “So for them to be the first one out of the shoot is kind of surprising.”

AvCraft didn’t create close to the number of jobs it promised when it first came to the area, despite incentives that were offered, Foxworth said.

Hill said council members shouldn’t worry because AvCraft today is under new ownership and has a new plan.

When AvCraft Support Services moved to the area in 2004 it struck a deal with the county and the Myrtle Beach Air Force Base Redevelopment Authority, that it would be reimbursed $750,000 for repairs to the hangars, if it met certain job goals. The company didn’t receive the full reimbursement because it didn’t create the number of jobs it had promised, Hill said. The company also was approved to get job development credits from the state in 2003 but never received any of the money, according to S.C. Department of Commerce records.

In 2005 AvCraft Support Services became insolvent and the company’s creditors kept the local business running. In 2010 KNH Aviation Services, Inc., a group of investors led by Hill, bought all of the company’s assets. The company does business as AvCraft Technical Services, keeping the AvCraft name because it was already recognized in the industry, Hill said.

“We are a different company than AvCraft Support Services,” he said. “We’re an extremely different company with an entirely different business plan. We believe we can support 200 employees and that’s what our goal is and we plan to be here for the long haul and do that.”

Foxworth said that he is hopeful that AvCraft will create the jobs that are so desperately needed, but that this announcement will also spur closer scrutiny of incentives in the future.

It is unusual for county council members not to know what company they are approving incentives for, and in the future Foxworth and Schwarzkopf said they will make sure they know and ask all necessary questions.

Horry County Councilman Paul Prince said he too wants to make sure he knows where incentives are going in the future, but trusts that the EDC is doing its job.

“If it goes through and it happens I’m excited and happy,” Prince said. “We hope we’ll get some people who will have some jobs.”

Jobs are the top priority for most Horry County residents and Thursday’s announcement is an important step in job creation, said Horry County Council Chairman Tom Rice.

“The future of Horry County is bright,” he said. “This is just the beginning and we’re going to see a lot more successes in the future.”