History

1908 - The Briggs Manufacturing Company was founded by Walter Owen Briggs to become the worlds largest independent producer of automobile bodies. The company was so successful that Briggs purchased the Detroit Tigers baseball team in 1935 and won the World Series in 1945. As the major car companies began to produce their own car bodies, Mr. Briggs looked for ways to keep his employees working, and in the late 1930's he expanded in to steel plumbing-ware production. With the purchase of Abingdon Sanitary Manufacturing in 1946 and Case Manufacturing in 1963, Briggs not only expanded its production capabilities, but also showed itself to be and innovative force in the plumbing industry. Case, as the developer of the one-piece toilet and the first to manufacture plumbing-ware in a variety of colors, put Briggs on the cutting edge of the industry. In 1973, Briggs built the Knoxville Steel Plant, the largest porcelain-on-steel plumbing-ware plant in the world.

1981 - Cerámicas Industriales Limitada was created and became a privately held company in 1983 under the corporate name CISA. At that time, Cisa acquired Fanaloza, adding to its portfolio of plumbing-ware companies, an industrial ceramic complex in Santiago Chile with over 100 years experience. CISA is deeply rooted in the plumbing-ware industry and owns, Venceramica, Edesa SA, and the recently acquired Sanitarios Colina. In 1997, CISA purchased 100% of Briggs Industries and therby strengthened its market presence in the United States. Briggs was restructured in 2000 to maintain the manufacturing sites for bathtubs and the sale of sanitary-ware in the US while relocating the production processes of vitreous china to the CISA plants in South America. 2005 brought the signing of William Houlin as the CEO of Briggs Industries and with him came a renewed focus on business development, technology enhancements and global supply chain development.

2006 - The expansion and modernization of the manufacturing facilities in Southern Chile has begun under the name 'The Mapuche Project'. This large-scale enhancement will increase the total capacity of CISA by one million pieces thus raising the annual output to 7.5 million units. The Mapuche Project, combined with the recent $3 million upgrade to the enameled steel facility in Knoxville TN, will make Briggs a part of one of the largest sanitary-ware manufacturers in the world.