LaGRANGE – Local job hunters now have a new place to go in their quest for work.

Labor Finders opened up a LaGrange branch on Monday with a ribbon cutting hosted by the LaGrange Chamber of Commerce. The company specializes in project based staffing, day labor, long term temporary, and temporary to hire jobs.

“We are excited to be in town, and we are looking forward to helping all the local businesses with any temporary staffing needs they may have,” said Labor Finders President Wesley Deck. “We do temporary staffing. We do temporary to permanent staffing, seasonal staffing, construction, industrial, CBL drivers, hospitality, clerical – I mean we do a little bit of everything.”

Labor Finders was established in 1975 and has 200 locations all over the U.S., including six offices and a staffing location in Georgia. It has been named Entrepreneur Magazine’s Franchise 400 listing since 2008.

“Labor Finders is a franchise,” said Deck. “… This is our sixth location. We also own an office in Newnan, Opelika, Columbus, Macon and Augusta.”

The company has been working to open a location in LaGrange for some time, and the management team was enthusiastic about the company’s future in a town that is undergoing so much growth.

“It’s a good opportunity,” said Alicia Tielking, a Labor Finders district manager. “We’ve wanted expand here for a while. It took a little longer then we had hoped to get an office over here, but I think it’s a good area. … I’ve serviced this area for 10 years out of my other offices around the area.”

The company started taking local applications a week before it opened, so it already has people working on the construction currently underway at LaGrange College and at a local plant.

“We are definitely excited about all the construction coming here, to this area,” said Branch Manager Dan Woltmann. “… So, hopefully we’ll be able to get local talent – construction talent – to all the job sites as opposed to general contractors bringing in crews. We’ll be able to have the people here who have those skills out at those sites.”

Ultimately, the company’s goal is to connect local workers with local jobs, so that the community can further benefit from the introduction of these new businesses coming to town.

“I think it is a great opportunity to put some local workers to work because what I’ve found is where we don’t have any local staffing agencies is they are bringing in workers from other communities instead of local people here in LaGrange,” said Tielking.

Labor Finders is located at 2170 West Point Road and may be contacted at 706-668-5554.