Contact lens maker moving to bigger site.

Byline: Joe Mosley The Register-Guard

SPRINGFIELD - A local company that has quietly manufactured specialty contact lenses for the past 25 years is bringing the future into focus with a move into the former administration building of the Willamalane Park & Recreation District.

Valley Contax, which specializes in gas-permeable lenses for people with astigmatism and irregular or misshapen corneas, is expected to move into the 6,000-square-foot Willamalane building at 200 S. Mill St. in May.

The company has outgrown its longtime production facility at 1110 N. 18th St. - a 3,000-square-foot building.

"We have no room for storage, and we're having a tough time finding room for employees to do their work," Valley Contax Vice President Janice Schramm said Tuesday.

The company has expanded steadily in the past several years, now averaging production of 350 to 400 lenses per day. Production is expected to increase by another 50 lenses per day within the next year and a half, because of a couple of new lens designs and plans for expanded distribution.

"With those thoughts in mind, and anticipating new designs as we go along, we know we will continue to grow," Schramm said.

Valley Contax recently completed its $740,000 purchase of the Willamalane building, which is next to the Willamette River. Its officials expect to spend another $50,000 on renovations and at least $10,000 on miscellaneous relocation costs.

Willamalane consolidated its administrative office and early childhood programs in the district's new Willamalane Community Recreation Center in December. The 22,000-square-foot building is next to the Regional Sports Center on South 32nd Street.

Bob Keefer, superintendent of the park district, said a sale of the quarter-acre Mill Street property was a critical part of funding for the new recreation center. "It was a great building while we were there, and it will work well for (Valley Contax)," Keefer said. "We needed to do it, and the price was right where it needed to be."

The Valley Contax operations are centered on computer-operated lathes, each weighing more than a ton, that sculpt glass lenses to specifications within hundreths of a micron (a millionth of a meter).

Its lenses are sold only to opthamologists, optometrists and opticians; Schramm declined to discuss the company's wholesale prices. The specialty lenses are considered expensive, but, she said, demand is high - especially for products such as graduated lenses that meet the complicated needs of aging retail customers.

"The presbyopia market is huge today, with all the baby boomers," Schramm said. "And a lot of them are not even aware there is a lens out there that serves their close-up needs as well as distance."

Valley Contax officials hope to make their move either on May 1 or during the Memorial Day weekend.

The company has a total of 24 employees in accounting, consulting, designing, customer service, laboratory work, administration and marketing. The move is not expected to create any immediate new posi- tions.