The plants and reel makers nearby
Encore Wire was founded in 1989 in a 68,000 sq ft warehouse in McKinney, and its single-site campus on Millwood Road now covers 460 acres with just under 3.5 million sq ft under roof, making copper and aluminium building wire and cable. Prysmian completed its acquisition of Encore Wire on 2 July 2024. The reel makers are close by too: Madem-Moorecraft's Denton plant, more than 200,000 sq ft, makes wood and plywood reels, recycles wood reels and added a second nailed-reel line in February 2025; and Lone Star Reel, part of the Carris group since 2016, builds plywood and nailed reels in McKinney and Bonham.
Where a reel yard helps a plant
- Inbound reels from suppliers. Plants receive material on reels that the supplier doesn't want back. Those one-way reels pile up and need clearing.
- Damaged returns. Reels coming back from customers that are no longer fit for the plant's own winding lines.
- Short-term reel needs. When an order needs more reels of a size than are on hand, sound used reels can cover the gap faster than a new build.
- Yard clear-outs. Old, mixed and unclaimed reels that have accumulated over years at the back of a site.
What we don't do
Plants that build reels to their own specification, or run their own return and refurbishment programs, don't need us for that. We don't make new reels, and we don't run a plant's return program for it. Plants making cable to strict standards may also have rules about which reels can carry their product; we'll supply used reels only where they meet those rules.
Encore Wire's reels
Encore Wire is one of the biggest sources of reels on DFW jobsites, and contractors often ask whether Encore takes them back. We could find no published reel take-back program from Encore Wire, so we tell contractors to plan to clear Encore reels themselves unless their supplier confirms otherwise in writing. Our guide, does Encore Wire take reels back, has more detail on what we checked.
Volumes and scheduling
Plants and reel makers produce reels in volume and steadily. Regular collection on a fixed day works best, with extra trucks when a clear-out is due. Loads are often large and mixed in size, so we plan trucks by count and flange size as for any big load.
Sorting a plant's reel yard
A plant's back lot usually holds several kinds of reel at once: its own returnable fleet waiting for refurbishment, customer returns waiting for inspection, supplier reels that came in full of copper rod or compound, scrapped reels pulled off winding lines, and a long tail of old reels from years ago. Before a clear-out, it helps to mark the reels the plant wants to keep. We take the rest, grouping them by build and condition at the truck so that sound reels go to reuse and the others to recycling.
Safety on plant sites
Plants have strict site rules: high-visibility clothing, hard hats, marked walkways, forklift exclusion zones and sign-in at the gate. Drivers follow them. If a plant needs contractor safety documentation or a pre-visit induction, we'll arrange it before the first pickup rather than on the day.
Questions
Do you supply reels to cable plants?
Used reels, where they meet the plant's requirements. For new reels built to specification, a reel manufacturer is the right source.
Do you take reels from a plant's own return program?
Only reels the plant has decided not to reuse or refurbish, and has released to us.
Can you clear an old reel yard?
Yes. Send counts and photos, and we'll plan the trucks.