Jones Family of Companies pushes forward with expansions and innovation.
While many bedding suppliers have put expansion plans on hold until the sleep market emerges from its sustained post-pandemic slumber, the Jones Family of Companies has chosen the opposite approach. In the past year, it has taken steps that increase capacity, expand distribution capabilities and deepen market reach.
These ambitious investments are designed to position the Humboldt, Tennessee-based fiber materials supplier for new growth when sales activity improves, says Ralph Jones III, chair and CEO. At the same time, as the bedding industry waits for the next rebound, the company’s recent moves strengthen its ability to meet current demand from existing sleep customers, as well as emerging needs in other business sectors.
“We’re expanding our product and distribution footprints so that we can get closer to all our partners,” Jones says. “By adding new sites in key regions, we improve our ability to ship orders quickly, and we also help customers lower their transportation costs since products don’t have to travel nearly as far. We’re making the investments now, so that when the bedding business comes back, we’ll be ready.”
Boosting Capacity: New Plants Enhance Production Capabilities
As part of this strategy, the Jones Family of Companies has added two new facilities to its production footprint. In early 2024, it opened a new 30,000-square-foot facility in Charlotte, North Carolina. The site enables Jones to ramp up production of popular components, such as Fiber Grade 1021, a densified polyester foam replacement pad used for both mattresses and furniture. This plant also will manufacture cold chain packaging — insulation liners used for shipping frozen foods and pharmaceuticals.
In addition, Jones took possession of a new leased facility in South Bend, Indiana, late last year. This site, which will open early this year, will produce comfort layer nonwovens for bedding, among other products.
With these additions, the Jones Family of Companies has a total of eight production and distribution facilities totaling 500,000 square feet. The other sites are in Humboldt and Morristown, Tennessee, where it has two facilities in each location; Amherst, New Hampshire; and Commerce, California. A ninth site is in the works for Dallas, where the company expects to open a distribution center later this year.
“The focus of each of our facilities relates to our strategic goals and the needs of the local marketplace,” Jones says, adding that the company’s Rontex division, for example, produces nonwoven fabrics for the automotive market in New Hampshire but has a distribution center in California. The Jones Nonwovens division produces its line in four locations: Humboldt, Morristown, Charlotte and most recently, South Bend.
A Family Tradition: The History of Jones Family of Companies
The Jones Family of Companies traces its roots to 1936, when Ralph Jones’ grandfather, Ralph Jones Sr., teamed up with his brother Ted to open Jones Manufacturing Co., a spinning mill in Humboldt. The brothers initially set up shop as processors of recycled textile byproducts, spinning the captured fibers into mop yarn.
is one of eight production and distribution facilities.
In 1981, under the leadership of Ralph Jones Jr. and his brother Wallis, Jones Manufacturing purchased Hogan & Associates, the nonwovens division of furniture giant Kroehler Manufacturing Co. The acquisition moved Jones into the furniture and bedding arenas for the first time as a provider of cotton batting.
Jones further strengthened its presence in the sleep products industry in 1996, when it acquired Southern Furniture Supply in Morristown. The addition of that plant gave Jones about 70% more batting capacity and led to the creation of Jones Fiber Products as an independent company manufacturing engineered, thermally bonded natural fiber products.
Jones’ sleep products business took another big leap forward in 2004, when California adopted a new open-flame standard for mattress flammability, and again in 2007, when a national standard (16 CFR Part 1633) went into effect.
“Prior to those events, we had developed a proprietary means by which we could fire retard cotton batting to meet various standards in the industry,” Jones says. “When the national standard was adopted, our ability to be a low-cost supplier of fire barriers for the mattress industry drew a lot of attention in the marketplace. And, consequently, we expanded significantly during that time.”
In 2007, Jones doubled the size of its facility in Morristown. New facilities also were opened in North Las Vegas and Humboldt.
“That gave us nationwide coverage as a leading supplier of FR solutions to the mattress industry,” he says.
A New Chapter: Leadership Transition at Jones Family of Companies
In late 2022, the board of directors elected Ralph Jones III as chair and CEO. Scott Butler, a longtime, third-generation executive with Jones, was elected president, leading the management team for Jones’ manufacturing and distribution operations, and John French joined the company as chief financial officer after 15 years of leadership roles in the manufacturing and textile industries.
One of the first steps the new leadership team took was to wind down the company’s domestic yarn operations. Once a cornerstone of its business, Jones’ yarn manufacturing had been steadily declining as new competition arose from offshore sources. In 2023, Jones closed its last spinning facility in Humboldt, refocusing its remaining manufacturing capacity on other markets.
Jones notes that his company has served the mop industry for nearly 90 years and “we remain committed to serving it for many years to come” via its network of quality offshore suppliers. The company also continues to supply specialty yarns for select customers.
Today, the Jones Family of Companies operates five bonus units: Jones Nonwovens, which produces fire barriers, bottom pads, comfort layers and foam replacement pads for bedding; Jones Yarn, which continues to supply imported natural and synthetic yarn products to the floor care industry; Rontex America, which produces needle-punch nonwoven materials for a variety of transportation applications; Eco Fiber Packaging, which produces plant-based and bio-preferred insulation liners for temperature-control packaging; and Cades Consulting LLC, an industrial maintenance and consulting company that Jones acquired in 2023.
“Bringing Cades on board dramatically increases our services to the nonwovens industry,” Jones says. “We now have the ability to not only grow our own business, but also provide support services to other nonwovens manufacturers across the U.S.”
Cades Consulting: Expanding Services to the Nonwovens Industry
The goal of Cades, Jones adds, is to help other textile producers enhance performance while also reducing the level of experience required to conduct various operations. Cades’ industrial maintenance crew has more than 215 years of combined experience in industrial maintenance and is available to conduct everything from preventive maintenance to the installation, removal or rebuilding of entire production lines. To meet the expected demand for its services, the division is in the process of expanding its workforce with new, younger technical talent.
“We’re making our team stronger, and hopefully making the market stronger,” Butler says, adding that the company also is investing in new equipment.
“We have a 9,000-square-foot machine shop for all repair, welding, fabrication and painting needs,” Butler says. “We work with conveyors, warehouse racking, safety guarding fabrication, onsite or shop welding and most other needs a nonwovens producer might have.”
On the consulting side, Cades’ services include risk management and mitigation, inventory management, production line layout and installation, production troubleshooting, quality control, management and teamwork training, and safety training.
As closer relationships are formed between Cades and other textile manufacturers, Jones expects new opportunities to emerge — for all parties. “As we gain a deeper understanding of our clients’ capabilities, we’re in a position to refer our own customers to another source if we get a request that we can’t fulfill but the other company is well suited for,” he says.
One-Stop Shop for Mattress Manufacturers: Jones Nonwovens Offers a Wide Variety of Components
The bedding and furniture segments of Jones’ business currently account for 46% of the company’s total sales. Other key markets include floor care, protective packaging, cold chain packaging, automotive and specialty materials such as absorbent pads, geo-textiles and filtration, sound dampening materials and pet products.
While sales to the mattress segment have been relatively flat in this post-pandemic period, the Jones Family of Companies has made up some of that ground by expanding its presence in the transportation and cold chain packaging markets. In addition, Jones is doing more business in the furniture arena, where it had a low profile until just a few years ago. “That’s when we discovered some novel ways to process polyester fiber and soft cotton into roll goods and other applications that work in both mattresses and furniture,” Butler says.
Bedding and furniture form the backbone of Jones’ business. “And we don’t see that changing,” Butler says. “We’re here for the long haul and are doing everything we can to help the sleep industry weather the current storm and grow when the market bounces back.”
As sustainable and natural materials become more prevalent in mattress line development, Jones continues to expand its range of cotton- and wool-based products, as well as products that incorporate plant fibers such as jute and hemp. The company has been a leader in sustainability since the company’s early days as a mop yarn supplier, Jones says. Today, it continues to use repurposed post-industrial textile byproducts as a raw material for many of the materials it produces, including mattress batting and insulator products.
“We’re always pushing the envelope with regards to innovation and sustainability,” says Dennis St. Louis, senior vice president of sales for bedding and furniture. “And we welcome opportunities to meet with our customers’ design teams to help them develop cost-effective solutions using sustainable materials.”
In addition to offering more materials with a strong sustainability story, Jones Nonwovens also is developing new FR products with stratified constructions that incorporate a soft cotton or polyester layer in addition to a T Bond FR barrier. Long a staple of Jones’ line, the T Bond line includes border and quilt panels, insulator pads and foam-replacement products that feature a proprietary FR solution created with a nonwoven blend of inherent rayon fibers. The line is now available in multiple dimensioned pads and roll packaging for easier processing in quilting applications. The company also offers its traditional nonstratified versions.
“Our new development of applying a sacrificial polyester layer to our FR for added loft together in one roll eliminates the need to process separate rolls of each through the quilting operation,” St. Louis says. “This is a labor and time savings for the mattress manufacturer, and it also reduces the number of SKUs in their inventory.”
This new line, along with Jones’ new pads with jute and hemp constructions, is just beginning to gain momentum in the sleep marketplace, St. Louis adds. “We’re excited to see the response, because we think both of these new solutions should have a lot of interest.”
Driving Innovation: Engineering the Future of Mattress Manufacturing
679FR and 1021 Densified Pad.
Developing performance tested, innovative and value-targeted solutions is a driving force in all the company’s business development strategies. In addition to products composed of a variety of natural, sustainable fibers and products engineered for robust FR barrier protection, Jones Nonwovens produces an extensive line of insulator pads, comfort layer fiber nonwovens and compression resistant bottom pads in a range of cotton and polyester blends. Each area of a mattress is manufactured with components that have performance and economic requirements unique to that specific structural zone.
“We recognize that product variety is a value-add for strategic sourcing,” St. Louis says. “So, we are committed to expanding our product offering with the largest selection of mattress components available from a single source.”
Jones Nonwovens’ ability to deliver FR barriers, insulator pads, cotton comfort layers, polyester products and even exotic fiber nonwovens in a single shipment “reduces our customers’ carrying expense and creates cash flow enhancement with increased inventory turns,” St. Louis says, adding that except for ticking, Jones Nonwovens offers a complete assortment of all the other textile products that go into making a quality mattress.
A Focus on Excellence: Driving Continuous Improvement in Manufacturing
Achieving high levels of customer satisfaction — a core goal for the Jones Family of Companies — involves ongoing engagement between its team members and customers along with an unwavering focus on product quality, Jones says.
“Product quality is not just a goal at Jones,” he says. “It is built into our standard operating procedures as recognized by our ISO 9001-2015 certification. Our equipment and processes include fiber web inspection to ensure that product performance specifications and customer expectations are met.”
The company’s focus on quality extends from its own plant floor to its customers’ production lines, where attention to details such as roll wind quality translates into trouble-free quilting.
“Our commitment to continuous improvement and lean manufacturing practices is a journey — not a destination,” Jones says. “We are continually looking for new ways to raise the bar on our performance.”
The fact that the Jones Family of Companies has a foothold in so many industries provides an opportunity for innovation and idea sharing, Butler says. For example, the company first began using jute fibers in cold chain packaging and automotive products. After success with those applications, it began combining jute with cotton to make comfort layers and pads.
“Natural products are gaining strength in bedding, and there are very few manufacturers that don’t offer a natural line these days,” St. Louis says. “Our jute-cotton materials give them another option for different layers in the bed.”
Throughout the years, Jones also has benefitted from the close partnerships it has forged with textile manufacturers and suppliers across the globe. These partnerships have allowed the company to “innovate and customize our products for a wide range of applications,” Jones says.
Family Values: Guiding Principles at Jones Family of Companies
Last year, Jones increased his stake in the Jones Family of Companies, becoming majority shareholder. In addition, a fourth generation of the family — his son, William — joined the team as business development manager after completing graduate school at Vanderbilt University.
“Jones has been in our family for nearly nine decades,” Jones says. “Over the years, we’ve had as many as 20 shareholders in the company but, last year, there was some consolidation of that as the family put new capital into the business. We wanted to make sure that the company had the resources it needs to kick-start a new round of growth.”
In 2025, Jones Nonwovens and its sister companies will focus on fine-tuning operations to accommodate all the changes it put into play last year.
“We’re a faith-based company, and we have faith that we are taking the right steps to grow our business and the industry,” Jones says. “We’ve made a lot of investments in both capacity and human resources that put us in a very good position for the future.”
The human side of the company’s business has long been a cornerstone of its success. “We depend on our people, and that’s only going to grow more important,” Jones adds. “We want them to thrive here, and we do everything we can to engage and support them.”
As part of this mission, Jones partners with Marketplace Chaplains, a Plano, Texas-based organization that provides chaplains to workplaces for one-on-one care and counseling sessions. The chaplains are available onsite for in-person meetings at Jones’ plants weekly, and they also can be reached 24/7 via phone.
“Our chaplains are available to anyone on our team at any time,” Jones says. “Whether you’re dealing with a recent loss of a parent or an issue relating to a child, the chaplains provide a helpful source of support.”
For Jones, cultivating relationships grounded in integrity and caring is a key component of its bottom line. “We believe in the golden rule of treating others the way we want to be treated,” he says. “And we measure our success by the relationships we develop with our customers, employees and partners, focusing on what is best for everyone we serve.”
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