‘We’re the coolest.’ A Chester County drink is named ‘coolest’ product made in SC
It was still mid-morning when Gov. Henry McMaster stepped to a statehouse podium Wednesday to announce which company makes South Carolina’s “coolest” product. An instant later, it was High Noon.
The High Noon brand of vodka and tequila seltzers produced in Chester County won the fourth annual Manufacturing Madness. High Noon topped 150 products in the South Carolina Manufacturers Alliance bracket-style contest to promote state products and companies.
“There are so many cool things made in South Carolina,” said Stein Edwards, facility director who accepted the award for High Noon. “We’re grateful to finally say that we’re the coolest.”
Gallo, the California-based winery that owns the High Noon brand, opened a $423 million facility three years ago in Fort Lawn. What started as a small section of a warehouse off a dirt road, and just a few employees, has grown. Now Gallo has more than 350 employees and is still hiring.
High Noon, a 20-flavor hard seltzer that mixes fruit juice and sparkling water with alcohol, runs on four manufacturing lines. The Fort Lawn site produces 1,000 cans per minute, or about 10.5 million cases per year.
Gallo in SC
Gallo also produces 5 million cases of other drinks in the Fort Lawn. Its warehouse there distributes about 19 million cases of products per year.
“That’s 9,000 trucks and 700 rail cars every year that we’re shipping out of that facility all over the country, and in fact all over the world,” Edwards said.
Early last year, Gallo detailed production plans to add vodka and brandy flasks at the Chester County plant. Gallo has more than two dozen brands from gin and tequila to whiskey.
The production at Gallo’s facility in Chester County is the type of success Manufacturing Madness aims to promote.
“South Carolina is a manufacturing powerhouse,” said Sara Hazzard, president and CEO of the Manufacturers Alliance. “Our companies are job creators, our employees are innovators and our products are used throughout the world.”
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About the made-in-SC contest
High Noon joins past winners Berkeley County steel, the F-16 Fighting Falcon plane from Greenville and the Honda Talon from Timmonsville. The online competition has drawn votes from more than 120 countries. This year there were more than 220,000 votes cast.
Of the 151 products that started the contest, 13 came from the Rock Hill region. York County had disc golf discs and rust prevention materials from Rock Hill, laser printers from Clover and three Fort Mill products (hot sauce, bow ties and needle roller bearings).
Lancaster County added pet health supplements and a grille-winch combination known as a “Grumper,” both from Lancaster.
Along with the winner, Chester County had tires and denim dye from Fort Lawn. The county added custom kitchens and veneer lumber from Chester.
