Editor’s Note: Welcome to the second video in our Getting Down to Business series. This month’s installment features Lightweight Manufacturing. As always, enjoy the show.

Lightweight Manufacturing serves the fabric structures and tent rental industry with the manufacturing of fabric panels. And when Lightweight Manufacturing wanted to expand its operation from the 22,000 square feet of industrial space it leased from the Allentown Economic Development Corp., company officials contacted LVEDC.

Lightweight Manufacturing, a business that constructs fabric panels for industrial coated fabrics which are then utilized as covers from permanent and temporary fabric structures, needed additional space to make its operations more efficient and to cut down on the company’s need to outsource. By owning a property, the company could more easily justify long-term investments.

LVEDC worked with the company, the Lehigh Economic Advancement Project and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to arrange for $720,000 in Pennsylvania Industrial Development Authority financing. With the money, Lightweight Manufacturing was able to purchase and renovate an industrial building and add an additional 10 new employees.