Industrial parts maker Timken plans to shutter its belts factory in Fort Scott, Kansas, a company spokesperson confirmed to Manufacturing Dive this week.
Timken will soon begin winding down its operations at the Fort Scott site, which will lay off 152 of the 155 employees, according to a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act notice.
Employees were notified of the plant’s closure on Nov. 30, 2023 and the plant is expected to close next year, the spokesperson said. The company will continue to produce belts at its facility in Springfield, Missouri.
Timken will also begin belt production at its manufacturing facility in San José Iturbide, Mexico, this year, Timken President and CEO Richard Kyle said in a November earnings call. The San José Iturbide site opened in December 2020 and Timken is expanding it to produce belts.
“Our operational performance has recovered from COVID and supply chain challenges, and we have excellent focus on driving improvement initiatives across our global operations,” Richard said on the call.
Timken is in the midst of closing multiple facilities. The company was scheduled to finish shutting down its bearings factory last month in Gaffney, South Carolina, laying off 187 workers, according to a March 2023 WARN Act notice. Operations have now ceased, though some maintenance workers remain at the site to oversee the final shutdown, a spokesperson said in an email.
“While difficult, we made decisions to close our Gaffney, S.C., bearings plant and our Fort Scott, Kan., belts facility to streamline our operations and restructure our manufacturing footprint to better compete in a global market,” the spokesperson said.
