The Appalachian Finishing Company Group is a commission knitter and dyer of cotton, polyester/cotton, and polyester fabrics. Based in Knoxville, Tennessee, Appalachian began as TNT Knits in the 1980s. Founder Gilbert Grimm added a dyehouse to the TNT Knits plant in 1990, and built a second dyehouse, the Appalachian Finishing werks, in 1992. The two dyehouses include Gaston pressurized jet dyeing machines, Fab-Con compactors, Tung Yang belt dryers from Tri-Tex, and a padder extractor designed and built by Grimm from spare parts. Appalachian processes 150,000 pounds of fabric each week with a yarn to finished goods turnaround time of between 20 and 24 days. Appalachian recently installed an ACS computer controlled spectrophotometric color matching system, high speed Vanguard Supereme 22 cut jersey knitting machines, Orizio four track jersey knitting machines, and Alandale creels.