Diamond Brand Gear Company, a stalwart of Western North Carolina’s outdoor industry, announced Friday that it is closing its doors after 143 years in business.
The company is only the latest in the Asheville area to close in the wake of Hurricane Helene.
“It is with deep sadness that Diamond Brand Gear Company must announce the permanent closure of our business, a direct result of the catastrophic damage sustained during Hurricane Helene on September 27, 2024,” the company’s CEO, John Delaloye, said in a statement.
“While we regret that we were not able to survive this disaster, we will never forget what we accomplished over the last 143 years,” he added. “We will always be grateful for such great people and so many relationships. From customers to employees, to our community and to our partners, we will miss them all.”
Based out of a 60,000 square foot facility in Fletcher, Diamond Brand Gear Company manufactures high-quality tents and other outdoor products. In 2015, the company split from Diamond Brand Outdoors, a popular retail store selling outdoor gear in downtown Asheville. The retail store remains open, an employee said Friday, although it suffered damage to its warehouse and much of its inventory during the storm.
It’s unclear how many employees at the Fletcher factory are losing their jobs this month.
Earlier this year, the company said around 40 people worked there, according to The Hendersonville Times-News. But in the aftermath of Helene, Delaloye started a GoFundMe to raise money to replace equipment and to rehire some employees who he said he had to let go when the company terminated its lease following the disaster.
“Within a few days of the disaster, I had to let go of all of our 35 employees,” he wrote on the fundraising page last month.
The fundraiser had garnered more than $11,000 in donations. In announcing the closure, Delaloye said he plans to repurpose the GoFundMe donations to “give our former employees small end of year gifts for the holidays.”
“I know this isn’t exactly what we intended to do together. However, I believe this would be one last, small way to help the people that made Diamond Brand so great,” he wrote to 52 donors.
Delaloye said that in recent weeks, Diamond Brand Gear Company “thought we might have a chance to come back albeit in a slightly different form.” But ultimately, the costs of rebuilding and recovering its sprawling facility at 145 Cane Creek Industrial Park Rd. in Fletcher were too great to bear.
“The unprecedented destruction caused by the hurricane rendered our facilities and critical infrastructure irreparably damaged,” he said. “After careful assessment and consultation with insurance providers, shareholders, and our management team, we concluded that rebuilding and recovery are not financially viable.”
The closure of Diamond Brand Gear Company’s operations is effective Dec. 18, 2024. All orders processed after the storm will be refunded, Delaloye said, and all recovery grants received will be returned and all loans repaid.
Hurricane Helene devastated much of the Asheville region, with businesses in some parts of town – such as Biltmore Village and the River Arts District – completely destroyed.
Even among businesses that avoided brick-and-mortar damage, recovery has been slow in part due to the region’s water crisis and the sharp drop in tourism to the area.
As a result, many local businesses have been forced to cut their hours and their staff as they seek to find a way forward. In recent weeks, other businesses that have closed include the popular River Arts District restaurant Vivian and the downtown Asheville location of Bold Rock Hard Cider.
