GREENE — Don’t tell Scott Campbell that manufacturing is withering in New York.

Dressed in a blue polo with a Raymond logo across the chest, he enthusiastically bounds down the spotless aisles in a 500,000-square-foot forklift manufacturing plant in the middle of some of the state’s most rural territory. Campbell proudly points to the laser cutting machines in the middle of the production floor that can precisely cut half-inch thick pieces of steel and the plasma cutting machine that treats 2-inch thick steel like butter.

“Manufacturing is alive up here and we’re going to have a rocking time in New York state,” said Campbell, a Johnson City resident.

Campbell was previewing the self-guided tour of the Raymond manufacturing plant, a Saturday event that hosted a crowd of more than 3,000 people including company employees, their families and the larger Greene community.

The company was celebrating its 90th anniversary on a rainy and overcast Saturday, but that didn’t stop a crowd from toasting the company that has grown from its humble beginnings in Greene to one of the world’s leading providers of equipment to the material handling industry.

Despite two sales and acquisitions of Raymond in quick succession between 1997 and 2000, Raymond has managed to strengthen its position, say company executives.

Raymond’s Greene operations, along with associated facilities in Syracuse and Muscatine, Iowa, boast sales of more than $1 billion. The Greene plant, now owned by Toyota Industries Corp., produces as many forklifts in two months as it did annually 12 years ago.

“We’ve elevated our game to a different league,” said Steve VanNostrand, Raymond vice president of human resources.

From a work force of about 750 people about six years ago, Raymond’s headcount now stands at close to 1,250. And the company is hiring welders, painters, assemblers, engineers and information technology personnel.

Campbell never thought his manufacturing engineering degree from the Rochester Institute of Technology would land him a career at a New York manufacturer. He thought, in all likelihood, he’d wind up in one of the Midwest’s manufacturing hubs.

An internship with Raymond developed into a junior engineering position. Now, after 20 years with the company, the Sayre, Pa. native directs the company’s quality and improvement programs.

“When I came here I never dreamed it would be such a satisfying experience,” Campbell said.