Posted on 12/03/2022 9:15:45 AM PST by robowombat
Former United Furniture employees share stories of mass layoff
The email from United Furniture announcing that the entire workforce had been terminated arrived in Denise Alomari's inbox at 10:56 p.m. Monday, but she didn't see it until Tuesday morning.
And even when she saw it, she didn't believe it was real.
“I thought it was a hack, but then folks started calling and I realized it was real. My heart just dropped,” Alomari said. “I went to work (Monday) and it was everything as normal. Nobody said a word. There was no hint about what was going to happen.”
Alomari worked in customer service at the United Furniture office in Verona six years. She said the company was "callous and impersonal" to fire people by email in the middle of the night.
Now she has a desk full of personal items that she can’t retrieve because the doors are locked. And she's not alone.
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How employees learned of layoffs Jeff Jones, a line supplier for United Furniture for more than 30 years, did not see the message Monday night from the company saying some 2,700 workers had been terminated.
Jones learned of it when a coworker messaged him.
"I was sound asleep (when it happened) and was checking my email early in the morning from a coworker. His message was pretty simple. The first one was we’re out of a job. I found the email and read it. We’re just all devastated. We didn’t see it coming," Jones said.
Others, like Mike Dempster, never saw the email before heading to the job.
“I went into work this morning, but when I got to the gate, they turned me around. I was not entirely shocked, but it looked like our work was picking up.”
Dempsey, who worked for the company for 18 years, said it was especially hard because of the time of the year it is.
“They did it right at the holidays. They should have given everyone notice ahead of time,” he said.
For some, the news was doubly hard because both husband and wife worked for the same company — like Doug and Jennifer Smith, who worked at the Furniture Wood Vardaman plant, and Jeremy and Melissa Smithey, who worked at Belden.
Melissa Smithey said the text from United woke her up at midnight.
“It hit me like a ton of bricks, and I could not sleep afterwards,” she said.
There were signs of trouble Jones said the company had reduced hours recently but said what happened Monday night was still unexpected.
"I’ve been with the company through several owners and names. We’ve always bounced back. In the email they made it perfectly clear there's no bouncing back from this," he said.
In hindsight, however, Alomari said there were some rumblings that the company was in financial trouble. During the October market in High Point, North Carolina, several people asked United CEO Mike Watson about the rumors of bankruptcy. She said Watson just brushed the rumors aside.
“We heard that bills were not getting paid but just figured that was the economy and things would pick up,” Alomari said.
While the bulk of the United employees had no idea the entire workforce would lose their jobs days before Thanksgiving, some higher ups in the company saw the writing on the wall and got out while they could, she said.
“Several vice president-level people have left the company in the last several months,” Alomari said.
Workers determined to bounce back Montel Harris, who worked at the Nettleton plant, said they had just set everything up for people to come back to work after the holidays.
“And they tell my my job was closed. I’ve been there seven years, and they don’t give me a notice ahead,” Harris said.
But he wasted no time trying to bounce back. He was at an Ashley pop-up job fair in Pontotoc Tuesday morning.
"I don’t need an unemployment check, I need a job,” he said.
Despite the bad news, Jones is keeping a positive attitude.
"I told my coworker that informed me that right before we got off for Thanksgiving holiday. Everyone got their Thanksgiving turkeys. I guess that turkey was our severance package," he said.
Jones said he and other coworkers have received a lot of well wishes and support, including people passing along job opportunities to consider. Right now, he sad he was calm.
"I think it’s the calm before the storm. Right now it seems surreal. We’re going to bounce back and hit the ground running," he said.
Yet we’re expected to believe the fabricated new jobs reports?
Sabotage avoidance.
I’m generally in favor of creative destruction of capitalism, but this really sucks. One of the problems is there were a lot of red flags that people ignored like all the execs fleeing, er, leaving.
Some enterprising employee should organize and structure a buyout and convert it to an employee owned business.
I remember reading years ago about a furniture company in Missouri that had complete open books with all employees. It created a lot of employee loyalty and goodwill.
Welcome to how things close. It happens. Way back in the day a friend of mine was the manager of a Dunkin Donuts. He came into work one morning to find that corporate had decided to end his store, corporate people were there hauling out equipment, they asked for his keys, they gave him his final paycheck, good luck. Yeah it sucks, but the business world, especially not the failing business world, isn’t sentimental.
This is the beginning of a real economic pandemic.
The storm will eventually collapse our currency and our government. We have kicked the can so far down the road that we are beyond repair.
Your employer does not care about you no matter how many times they say they do.
BidenDepression II 2023
Yep
Yes it’s a story as old as time. Businesses fold.
But I hope there’s a special place in hell for managers that hide behind technology in letting people go. It’s cowardly.
I signed up expecting new jobs
What a sad joke
It’s like 2008 again
Oh if one wants to deal with the thieves and the Karens........
That’s more than likely true
I took a severance at one company that shocked the CEO who expected I'd accept their option offer. I didn't because I saw the handwriting on the wall. Went to work for their competitor. Less then one year the company completely shut down it's entire businesses across the nation. So I avoided the ultimate end I saw coming.
Just before and After Christmas is usually when these decisions on what stores to close happen. But there are always indicators it's coming.
Jones said he and other coworkers have received a lot of well wishes and support, including people passing along job opportunities to consider. Right now, he sad he was calm.
“I think it’s the calm before the storm. Right now it seems surreal. We’re going to bounce back and hit the ground running,” he said.
Local paper locally owned
It’s become a desert filled with mirages, holograms and AI.
Bidens fun house of mirrors.
I hope the laid-off people discover new jobs at a company that is better managed, or work for themselves and do even better.
Bovine loser excrement.
Reminds me of a story about Denny McClain and Farmer Peets...
https://99wfmk.com/farmer-peet/
From the 1800s up until the 1990s, anyone who grew up in Michigan enjoyed the lip-smackin’ meats from Farmer Peet’s. The Bonanza Hams, Hickory Sticks, sausages.....and their famous “Repeeter” bacon.
So after over 100 years of eatin’ Peet’s meats, where did they go?
Peet Packing had been based in the Saginaw County town of Chesaning since the company’s creation in 1886. Originally called the G.M. Peet City Meat Market, generations of the Peet family kept the company thriving for 109 years. They cranked out bacon, different varieties of franks, hams, sausages, canned lard & shortnin’, sandwich meats, and bologna...and Michiganders literally ate ‘em up...day after day, years after year.
At Peet’s peak, they had packing plants not only in Chesaning, but also in Bay City and Grand Rapids.
Increasing costs were having a strain on Peet Packing and they were feeling the pinch in the early 1990s. Then along comes former Detroit Tiger pitcher Denny McLain. He and a partner bought the Peet company - and fans of both Farmer Peet and McLain had high hopes for a resurgence of the company. But it wasn’t to happen.
They purchased Peet on January 20, 1994.....a year and a half later, on June 1, 1995, Peet closed for good, putting 250 people out of work. What happened?
According to Crain’s Detroit Business, McLain and his partner stole pension money as they “siphoned off $3.1 million from the fund to a shell corporation”. The fund had over 12 million dollars, sucked down to 9 million after McLain and partner took over.
The two were convicted and McLain was sentenced to prison for 8 years and 1 month, on charges of “conspiracy, mail fraud, theft of pension, and money laundering”. He was out after six years...he maintains to this day that he wasn’t aware of any wrongdoing that may have been committed by him or his partner.
Read More: Whatever Happened To Farmer Peet’s Meats? | https://99wfmk.com/farmer-peet/?utm_source=tsmclip&utm_medium=referral
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