Steelcase Closing Two Plants, Trimming Hundreds Of Jobs

[CShine]

GRAND RAPIDS -- Steelcase Inc. said Tuesday it will close two wood-furniture factories, eliminating 640 manufacturing jobs, and also cut 130 salaried positions within its North American operations.

The plants in New Paris, Ind., and Fletcher, N.C., employ 160 and 480 people, respectively.

The closings will take place within the next six to 12 months and reduce Steelcase's overall manufacturing space by 1 million square feet, the company said in a news release.

http://www.freep.com/news/latestnews/pm18142_20040127.htm

[Sandpiper]

1. My best friend from High School

Used to work at the Fletcher, NC plant. Glad he doesn't anymore.

[hadrons]

2. I wonder how proud they are of that Buh vote???

[0007]

3. I thought America was going back to work?

I thought they said things were looking up, new factories were opening, people were going back to work?

The stock market is going up is about the only thing see that looks good, and I'm not sure about that either.

[Tesha]

6. "You want fries with that?"

I thought America was going back to work?

"You want fries with that?"

Tesha

[bleedingheart]

4. My in laws in Grand Rapids told me that Steelcase used to be the

best employer but when it was bought out the managment of the new group started laying people off and cheapening a once stellar company.

[noonwitch]

7. I grew up a mile from Steelcase world headquarters

Their operating CEO in the 70s lived around the corner from my house, his name is Frank Merlotti, and I heard (from my mom who is not always reliable) he's been hired back. My dad was friends with John Idema, who was a member of the family that owned it then. We called his wife "Auntie Bea".
Anyways, when I was a kid, Steelcase was a model of corporate responsibility. They were non-union, because they took such good care of their employees. They always provided the best insurance, paid their employees well and had a family counseling center to assist their employees in times of need. Everyone got profit-sharing checks on a yearly basis, also.
My high school boyfriend's dad was an employee when he died of a heart attack. The company always made sure that his kids were taken care of. They helped my guy get low-interest student loans and gave him a job when he graduated from college.

It's very sad to hear about the company's problems, as everyone connected with Steelcase back then was so proud to work there. I hope the did hire Mr. Merlotti back, he did a good job back then. Mr. Idema is deceased and I don't know where Auntie Bea is these days. If she is still alive, she's probably in Florida.

[salin]

5. Looks like this week's announced mass layoffs are going to surpass

those of last week.

Wonder if Bush will be able to claim another month of net job creation (technically 1,000 new jobs - at an average per state of 20 jobs - is net "growth")?

Where is Bush's "job czar?"... Oh... was he assigned the job that Bush promised India - that the admin would work to prevent any state-level efforts at stemming the flow of outsourcing US jobs to India? Or perhaps the efforts are spent on helping businesses figure out how to take advantage of the new overtime laws (why hire more if you can get even more work from the few AND pay them less??!!??)

[mbperrin]

8. Wow! Look at that *Bush job machine go!

There the jobs go!