Georgia Exports Company (GEC) is the industry leading exporter of Southern Yellow Pine (SYP) originating in the Southeastern USA. This private and family owned business founded in 2012 by brothers Jon and Wilson Burns is located in Springfield, Georgia.
GEC originally began with a 10 acre site in Springfield which has grown to encompass over 60 acres of land with storage capacity for more than 750 truck loads of SYP logs. Today the Springfield site is the flagship facility of the GEC global export program and supports an additional five state-of-the-art export yards located throughout the Southeast. Combined; these six facilities have the capacity of loading more than 1,000 containers weekly for export.
GEC is the only fully integrated exporter of SYP in the Southeast. They provide a full range of services such as, the procurement of timber, all related documentation, securing export bookings, creating ocean bill of ladings, and providing phytosanitary certificates. As a licensed fumigator, GEC performs all government required fumigations on-site along with any required insect testing. Through their trucking partner, Freeport Transportation, GEC provides all container drayage between the six yards and the Georgia Ports Authority Garden City Container Terminal. It is within this full scope of services that GEC provides that allows savings to be passed along to our customers around the world.
GEC opened its first sales office in Qingdao, China in 2015. This office employees a staff who is responsible for all sales into coastal China. The GEC China sales team works directly with numerous saw mills in the region to facilitate all import containers and their required documentation.
GEC prides itself as being the gold standard and number one SYP exporter in the Southeast. They are dedicated to world class service and delivering a superior product on time that not only meets, but exceeds our customer’s needs.
The Burns Family History
The Burns family began work in the timber industry in the year 1900 with 185 acres in Northern Effingham County, Georgia. A commissary originally built in 1906 to serve as a convenience store of sorts, is perfectly preserved and still used today as a timber dealership office.
By the mid 1900’s, the Burns family had grown the farm to 900 contiguous acres and operated a cotton gin, grist mill, and saw mill. They also accumulated other timber tracts in Screven and Effingham counties throughout the latter half of the century. Logging and land clearing operations continue today, and the family has a deep sense of pride and delight for the land they have thrived on for so many years. Stewardship of the land, conservation of resources, and the harvest and reforestation of timber are top priorities for the family.