ORLEANS, Vt. (AP) – Ethan Allen Interiors’ plans to close a factory in North Carolina will benefit its workers Andover, Maine, and two Vermont plants, who will pick up extra work, the furniture manufacturing company announced.

A cabinet factory in Spruce Pine, N.C., will close, and an upholstery plant in Atoka, Okla., will be converted to a distribution center. The North Carolina plant’s work is being sent to other company factories that make cabinets, including those in Orleans and Beecher Falls and another in Andover, Maine, said company spokeswoman Peg Lupton.

“It helps us better utilize the efficiency that has been created and better utilize the capacity that we have in the northern plants,” she said. “The fact that it is better utilizing the capacity that we already have means it helps us keep the jobs that we already have.”

Ethan Allen employs more than 800 people in its Northeast Kingdom factories, said Daniel Kurzman, who is in charge of those plants and the Maine operation.

“This is a positive for the two manufacturing facilities in Vermont,” Kurzman said. “Product from the two other plants will be made here. It will stabilize the work force.”

AP-ES-09-07-06 1516EDT