By Carol Coultas,Business Writer

AUBURN – An arrangement between Tambrands and an Ohio manufacturing services firm will mean about 40 new jobs for the area and allow the tampon maker to focus more on its core business.

Cates & Associates of Milford, Ohio, won a contract to make the cardboard tubes for Tampax and is now hiring 40 to 45 people. The new hires will work at Tambrands’ Hotel Road facility, operating the machinery that converts paper into the tubes. But they will be employees of the contractor, not Procter & Gamble, the parent company of Tambrands.

“We call it a vendor managed’ arrangement,” said Steve Tattershall, a Cates consultant. He likened the arrangement to businesses with on-site cafeterias that operate as independent franchises, yet have a lot of interaction with the host company.

“The company doesn’t want to know the details about the vendor, but expects it to meet certain standards and get the job done,” said Tattershall. “We’re applying that concept to a production operation.”

Dennis Rogers, spokesman for the Auburn plant, said having Cates employees take over the cardboard tube production allows Tambrands to move its more experienced personnel into other areas of the plant where they’re needed more. The facility makes 10 million tampons a day, which are distributed throughout North America. It employs 600 people, making it the cities’ largest private employer.

“This allows us to focus on our core business – manufacturing tampons,” not their containers, said Rogers. The plant also makes Pearl tampons, a relatively new product line that uses a plastic applicator rather than a cardboard tube.

Rogers said Tambrands has used contracted labor in the past, generally when it’s transitioning from a manual operation into an automated one.

“It comes down to a Procter & Gamble strategy of identifying our core business and focusing on that,” said Rogers. “With ancillary operations, we can look for other resources.”

Tambrands is also looking to hire technicians for its other plant operations. Pay for those openings starts at $11.70 per hour, with opportunities to make more than $23 per hour on a 12-hour rotation schedule.

The Cates jobs are full time, with some benefits, said Tattershall. He said Cates is re-examining its health benefits, so he didn’t have details, but the company will offer paid holidays and vacation to its employees. He said pay will be competitive and commensurate with experience.

The Cates workers will have stable shifts – a departure from Tambrands employees, who rotate day and night shifts.

“We’re a great believer that the flexibility you gain having people work day into night shifts is not strong enough to compensate for the interruption to the employee’s biorhythm,” said Tattershall, adding that Cates employees will likely work 10- to 12-hour shifts, either as day or night workers. “We realize that runs contrary to our customer’s philosophy … but different companies have different cultures.”

Tattershall declined to say what the pay range was for the new jobs and the length of the contract, although he did call the jobs “long-term.”

“We expect the contract will be renewed over time,” he said.

Cates expects to fill the openings by early June. It’s the first time the company has come to Maine.

For more information: Applications are being accepted at the CareerCenter, 5 Mollison Way, Lewiston. Information may be obtained by calling 753-9001.