Our History

Chemglass Inc

Chemglass is a privately held, family-owned business. The principals of the company are: Walter E. Surdam CEO (retired) , David Surdam President CG Life Sciences, Philip Surdam President Chemglass , Howard Hayman Vice President CG Life Sciences, Alan Durham Vice President of Production CG Life Sciences , and Tony Mavilla Vice President of Operations, CG Life Sciences.

The Company was founded by Walter P. Surdam in 1946. He was a glassblower by trade for the Kimble Glass Co. in Vineland and became a supervisor during World War II. Upon leaving Kimble Glass, he opened a small shop (about 1500 square feet) and employed two other glassblowers in the town of Newfield, about 5 miles from our present location.

In 1980, Chemglass moved to the new Vineland Industrial Park with fifteen employees into a new 6000 square feet building. As time went on and the company grew, four additions were added to that building, making a total of 30,000 square feet. By the mid 1990's, more space became necessary and the company purchased two other facilities in the Vineland area.

As the company continued to prosper, the plans for a new facility were initiated, those plans however, were never executed; as the current building we call Building 1 became available and the construction of the new building was not needed. A building with 85,000 square feet then became available on 15 acres across the street from our (then) current building and after a year of remodeling and preparing for manufacturing, the majority of the operations moved in at the end of 2004.

Chemglass Life Sciences LLC

Chemglass Life Sciences LLC, was established in 2009 as the distribution arm for Chemglass, Inc. for the manufactured scientific and chemistry products. Chemglass Life Sciences also carries a complete line of chromatography vials/closures and cell/ tissue culture products. Our ever-increasing product lines will keep us on the forefront of scientific innovation.

In 2018, we completed construction of a 75,000 sq ft facility, next to our existing Building 1. We were able to move our satellite facilities and growing machine shop into this building—bringing all of our operations onto a single “campus” for the first time in our history.

We then created two additional companies; CG Bioscience and CG Machine, which reside in that building—3800 N. Mill Rd, Vineland NJ: Building #2.

In 2024, we completed construction of a 35,000 sq ft facility across the street from our recently completed building-where we will be able to consolidate our container business under a single roof-and created a new company to focus on these products (Chemistry and Chromatography Class Vials): CG Container.

Chemglass now has over 265 employees, including Account Managers covering the United States; and operates 4 separate buildings with a total of 225,000 square feet-all located in the Vineland Industrial Park in Southern New Jersey.

In no way will the formation of these new companies compromise the quality of the products or goodwill that Chemglass, Inc. has achieved over the past nearly 80 years in the research community.

Chemglass Life Sciences, CG Biosciences, CG Machine, and CG Container will continue the tradition of excellence that has made Chemglass, Inc. products an integral part of chemistry performed in laboratories throughout the world & we will continue to provide the outstanding quality and service that you have come to expect.

Hopefully, you will find the information about the company, not only informative, but interesting-and we would like to thank you for taking the time to visit our website.

The Surdam Family