West Street in Red Bank,
company moving to Wall
After 30 years on
West Street in Red Bank,
company moving to Wall
By gloria stravelli
Staff Writer
Jack North will be moving his company, which manufactures clay used extensively by industry and the fine arts community, from Red Bank to Wall in a few months.
What do a public monument immortalizing the work of Leonardo DaVinci and the Batmobile have in common? If you didn’t guess Red Bank, you’re forgiven.
The borough is home to a 110-year-old company that is the world’s largest supplier of a synthetic modeling clay used in industrial and fine arts applications like the 24-foot-high DaVinci Horse that sits in a public plaza in Milan, Italy, and the signature vehicle used in the Batman movies.
However, clay manufacturer Chavant Inc., West Street, is being pushed out of Red Bank by a combination of its own success and the borough’s.
"We’ve outgrown this building. We’ve found new markets and make more clay than we did 10 years ago," explained Jack North, owner and president of Chavant, which has been in Red Bank since 1972.
"Red Bank is growing so fast and there’s no place to go," he added. "Manufacturing doesn’t fit in with Red Bank’s art galleries, restaurants and financial district. There’s just no room."
Plus, North said, traffic control and lax parking enforcement made it difficult for tractor-trailers making deliveries to access the property. "Red Bank’s not set up for 18-wheelers, and we get two a day," he noted.
North wanted to stay in the area in order to retain the company’s 10 employees, but couldn’t find a larger space nearby, so Chavant will break ground this week on a new 25,000-square-foot facility in Wall. Construction is scheduled to be completed by year-end.
When North heard about plans to construct a theater on the Blaisdell site abutting the Chavant properties, he got in touch with developer Gemini Group. "I thought it would make sense for them to buy this property," he noted. A deal was struck, but North declined to disclose the purchase price of the properties, which are assessed at $303,600.
The two, 12,500-square-foot Chavant buildings used for manufacturing and an adjacent residence, at 38-42 West St., are being sold to Gemini, which has obtained the approval of the Red Bank Zoning Board for use of the property as a scenery shop for the Two River Theatre Company, which will build a 300-seat theater on a portion of the Blaisdell site.
Expanding sales have made Chavant first among the six leading makers of modeling clay in the world, North said.
The company manufactures 30 different types of nonhardening modeling clay. "Each has a different character," explained North, of Wall. "Every artist uses a different type."
Preferences are based on characteristics like the degree of firmness at room temperature, pliability, color and the material’s ability to be polished or painted, he said.
The synthetic clay, which is made from fillers, oils, waxes and pigments (North won’t divulge specifics for competitive reasons), is used primarily by auto-makers to make prototype vehicles, in fine arts for sculpture molds, and by movie studios for special effects and makeup.
If you’ve seen Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Superman or Men in Black, you’ve seen the end result of the use of Chavant clays, North said. The Plasteline™ made at the West Street plant is also used for taxidermy, prosthetics, ballistics, museum exhibits and architectural models by a host of global companies.
According to North, Chavant was founded in France by chemist Claude Chavant in 1892. Originally a supplier of chemicals used in early photography, clay was a sideline then, he explained. Although most of the company’s records have been lost, North said it appears that Chavant moved the company to Jersey City around the turn of the century. From around 1910-40, the company concentrated on the manufacture of children’s modeling clay, primarily for toymaker Milton Bradley Co. A letter dated 1924 shows that Plasteline was registered under the Chavant name, he added.
In 1960, Chavant was purchased by Rumson resident Paul O’Neil, who built up the company’s industrial business until it was the largest supplier of modeling clay for industrial applications – mainly automotive – in the world, with licensees in Japan and England. O’Neil moved the company to Red Bank around 1972.
According to North, designers for major automakers all use Chavant’s Plasteline for making prototype models. Records show that General Motors has been a customer since 1928 when legendary model maker Harley Earle used Chavant clay to make the first clay model of an automobile prototype.
"Just about every car you see is done in our clay," said North, "from the 1950 Buick LeSabre to the Honda Insight (the first gas-electric hybrid car sold in the U.S.)."
An O’Neil family friend, North joined the company as general manager in 1989 after graduating from the University of Denver with an MBA and became a partner in 1991. North said his contribution to the company, already a strong industrial presence, has been to expand Chavant’s other business. "It was a good company that had room for simple improvements. I’ve developed much further the fine arts sectors, which includes special effects, and maintained the industrial side," said North, who took over the company when O’Neil retired in 2001.
"This company was very dependent on one industry, and my thought was to diversify. Fine arts was a natural extension. We already had exposure, but not enough," explained North whose strategy included acquiring a smaller clay manufacturer that catered to the fine arts sector.
When he joined the company in ’89, fine arts accounted for 5 percent of Chavant’s sales; today that sector accounts for 40 percent.
While North declined to divulge annual sales, he said Chavant’s clays sell for between $1.60-$5 per pound, adding that the mold for a car can require from 600-4,000 pounds of Plasteline, while the DaVinci Horse required 20,000 pounds of the synthetic clay.
According to North, conventional wisdom in the mid-1990s was that technological advances would make clay modeling obsolete, but those forecasts didn’t hold up.
"They said computers would replace the clay process. Automakers spent billions on computers, holograms, virtual reality and stereolithography," he said. "They are all great tools, but when it comes down to it, clay is nontoxic, works by hand, doesn’t produce dust and is reusable. "What they found in the long term is that technology is great, but if they have to change anything, it’s a very expensive process," North continued. "Plus, you can’t touch an image on a computer screen; with clay, you can touch it. The computer is a tremendous tool, but just because you get a new tool, you don’t throw the old ones away."