Procter & Gamble to Team with Eastern Panhandle Colleges to Build Workforce

Groundbreaking for the new Procter & Gamble Company in Berkeley County is expected to be this fall.

Stephen Christian is the executive director of the Berkeley County Development Authority. In a speech to the community Friday, Christian said negotiations for what became the plans to bring Procter & Gamble into the county began in fall of 2012.

West Virginia competed with two other states for the company, with its biggest rival being in Pennsylvania. It will take two to three years before the company is operational, but once completed could cover 1 to 3 million square feet and employ over 700 full-time employees making anywhere from $40,000 to $70,000 a year.

Christian says the jobs offered will be in high-tech fields working with computers and robotics.

“It’s my understanding that the Procter & Gamble Human Resources Team is working directly with Blue Ridge CTC, and with Shepherd [University], and with James Rumsey [Technical College] on the beginnings of how those things are going to be implemented, how they’re going to manifest themselves, and having a background in some manufacturing, or some engineering, or having a background in some software management and control management for machining is probably going to be advantageous.”

Christian says the company has not yet revealed which products will be produced at the Berkeley County site, but says there will be a variety of brands.