Posted on 02/10/2007 6:50:51 AM PST by Extremely Extreme Extremist
(AP) NEW HOLSTEIN, Wis. -- The Tecumseh Products Co. announced Friday it plans to close its manufacturing plant by the end of August and move operations to "low-cost countries."
The company said up to 220 workers will be laid off around April 13, with the company laying off the remaining 320 workers around Aug. 31.
"Tecumseh over the past several years has increasingly outsourced the manufacturing of components and certain small engines to low-cost countries, including India, Brazil and China," James Bonsall, Tecumseh president and chief operating officer, said in a Friday press release. "The impact of the decision announced today on Tecumseh's remaining workers in New Holstein is deeply regrettable, but unavoidable."
The closing of the plant had been rumored for years and confirmed by union officials in November, but Tecumseh had remained silent about its plans until Friday.
"I always keep a slight ray of hope open, hoping that maybe just something will turn around and we might have Tecumseh for a number of years to come," New Holstein Mayor Ron Karrels said.
The Tecumseh plant has operated in New Holstein since 1956 and currently produces component parts for the company's medium-sized engines, designed for snow blowers, garden tractors, wood splitters and large generators. It employed 550 people in mid-2006 and as many as 1,500 in 2000.
Bonsall said the decision to close the plant and move operations elsewhere "enhances Tecumseh's ability to compete in the highly competitive global business environment."
Heus Manufacturing Co. plans to purchase the plant and begin operations there within 60 days, according to Heus chief executive officer Mark Enneper.
Heus has expanded from 60 to 100 employees in the last year, and would like to hire that many employees in the next year as it moves from its current 50,000-square-foot facility to the 85,000-square foot Tecumseh plant, Enneper said.
"We really could use (the plant space) because we're just up to our eyeballs with needing extra machinery," he said.
Heus manufactures primarily specialty iron items such as service parts, prototypes and anything that is oddly shaped or too big to cost-effectively produce overseas, Enneper said.
Job leaving town? Thank your union bosses.
Did Tecumseh ever make an engine that would idle smoothly?
Good riddance.
I found something odd the other day. A teamsters union local website with a link to FreeRepublic.
As a kid, I had a go-cart with a Tecumseh engine in it. It SUCKED. Briggs and Stratton engines were far better.
Briggs & Honda made far superior engines.
We have simply got to lower the costs of doing business here in America.
BTTT
Shocked, i tell ya.
Unions - the death knell of American industry.
Yeah, I had mini bikes, gokarts and landscape equipment with teecumseh engines as a kid. I definitely preferred briggs stuff. Tecumseh parts were a pain to get, and their carburetors sucked balls bigtime. I had one minibike thta would go through oil faster than gas. it was great at mosquito control.
By lowering the wages and eliminating benefits?
I noticed willie got the ax some time ago.
Unions have forgotten their original intent and become greedy political animals. Obviously that doesn't translate down to the average union member but some people prefer that fantasy to reality.
Michigan became an industrial powerhouse with strong unions and we feel to our current welfare state with those same unions.
What about corporations?
My sister's snow blower has a Tecumseh engine.It's not one that I'd mistake for something that came out of a Ferrari but it starts every time and it has been reliable.
Them too. I've worked for both good and bad companies as well as good and bad unions. In both cases, treatment of labor made a big difference in the happiness of employees. I would go so far as to say that a happy employee is far more loyal than a wealthy one.
I've got a roto tiller here that was my great grandmother's. I would say that it's 60 years old but I still use it.
While driving outside Pune in India, I came across a HUGE
factory doing nothing but making Tecumseh engines....
Hey, UAW Local 750 - how do you feel about extorting more money from Tecumseh NOW?
I finally got an authorized Tecumseh service shop in another town to admit that the carburetor is defective and the fuel tank needs a check valve to prevent flooding. But it's now out of warranty, so it would cost approximately 1/2 the original price of the generator/engine combination to have a new carburetor installed and the tank fixed. Tecumseh won't even sell me a new carburetor and just tells me to go back to the out of town Tecumseh authorized shop. I am now tired of the runarounds and I'm stuck with a virtually useless piece of Tecumseh junk unless I sell it to some unsuspecting poor slob for much less than it cost, which I have enough honesty and decency not to do.
AFAIC Tecumseh can move anywhere it wants and I say good riddance to bad rubbish. Of course the down side is the hundreds of American workers who will lose their jobs, but I'm sure the convenience store industry will take up the slack if the supply of Pakistani and Arab immigrants runs short. (sarcasm)
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.