Sweetheart Cup

In the face of tough questions from Hampstead residents and Town Council members last night, the county's economic development director defended the deal he and state officials worked out to persuade Sweetheart Cup Co. to build its new mid-Atlantic distribution center south of town on Houcksville Road.John T. Lyburn, director of the county Department of Economic Development, attended the meeting at the request of council members, who feel the Sweetheart Cup project will have a major impact on their town.

Sweetheart Cup Co. Inc. officials said yesterday that it would build a $20 million distribution center near Hampstead and announced plans for a joint venture with Baltimore-based EarthShell Corp. to manufacture environmentally friendly disposable food packaging.The company, one of the country's largest manufacturers of disposable plastic and paper products with $844 million in sales last year, has submitted a proposal to the Carroll County Department of Planning for a mid-Atlantic distribution center that would be just over 1 million square feet and sit on 141 acres on Houcksville Road near Route 30.Tom Uleau, Sweetheart's president and chief operating officer, said yesterday that construction is expected to begin next month and the center should be running by late spring or early summer.

Owings Mills-based Sweetheart Cup Co. Inc. is looking at property in Baltimore, Carroll and Harford counties for an expanded East Coast distribution center, officials in those counties said.Baltimore County's economic development director, however, said the manufacturer of paper cups and plates is close to purchasing a site in that county.The director, Robert L. Hannon, said Sweetheart has been negotiating for an expansion site for some time. The company favors an undeveloped tract in eastern Baltimore County over two in Carroll and Harford counties, he said.

Sweetheart Cup Co., which employs more than 2,000 people at its Owings Mills headquarters and factory, will sell 48 percent of its voting stock in a deal that will combine many operations with Vermont-based Fonda Group Inc., officials said yesterday.The deal also calls for Sweetheart's primary shareholder, American Industrial Partners, to give the Fonda Group management responsibility over the company. The agreement is aimed at expanding opportunities and cutting costs at the two companies that make disposable food packaging.

Sweetheart Cup Co. Inc. was founded as an ice cream cone-making business, but the company intends to sell off its Eat-It-All cones to concentrate on the making of paper and plastic products.The Owings Mills-based company said yesterday that it will sell its baking division to Ace Baking Co. of Green Bay, Wis. The price was not disclosed.Ace is expected to keep Sweetheart Cup's employees. The deal is expected to be completed Dec. 1.The bakery division, which employs 320 people, represents 3 percent of Sweetheart Cup's business and is the only bakery item the company makes.

Sweetheart Cup Co., a major Baltimore County employer that said last summer it was considering a public stock offering and merger offers, will remain a privately held, independent company.Daniel M. Carson, Sweetheart's vice president and general counsel, said the company had held "substantive discussions" with prospective investors whom he would not identify. But he said Sweetheart's board of directors decided last month against a sale or public stock offering."With continuing success in the execution of our business plan, our ownership expects the value of our company to increase and that Sweetheart will strengthen its leadership position in the industry," the company said in a statement issued in response to questions about its future.

Sweetheart Cup Co., one of Baltimore County's five biggest )) employers, said yesterday that it is entertaining offers from outside investors and contemplating a public offering of stock.William McLaughlin, Sweetheart's president, said the company has recently received "unsolicited expressions of interest about investing in or seeking a combination with" privately held Sweetheart. The company's board is considering those offers as well as pursuing its original goal of taking the company public.

After more than a decade of management and financial turmoil that ravaged a once-premier Baltimore company, Sweetheart Cup Co. is coming back, and in more ways than one.It has posted its first annual profit in five years. Its net worth has climbed out of the hole. Sales are rising.And the successor of the old Maryland Cup Co., which has had operations in the Baltimore area since 1920, may be returning home to Owings Mills.Sweetheart, the nation's largest maker of plastic and paper cups, plates, cutlery and ice cream cones with $845.

Community Service Develops Better CitizensIn his Dec. 1 letter, J. Edward Johnston Jr. criticized the state's plan to infuse a community service requirement within the public education curriculum. I feel that the positive impact of this decision far outweighs any negatives.There is a great deal more to education than simply the material covered within the classroom. Education is much more than the simple mastering of skills that can be quantitatively measured through testing.True education requires exposure to and interaction with the community.