Dive Brief:
- Battery maker Energizer Holdings is closing its manufacturing plant next year in Fennimore, Wisconsin, and laying off 172 workers in the process, the company said in a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act letter on Monday.
- The first employee will be laid off on Dec. 1. More layoffs will come in the following months, until Energizer closes its facility in September.
- The layoff news comes months after Energizer initially confirmed its plans to close plants in Fennimore and Portage, Wisconsin. The company has not yet issued a WARN letter for its Portage plant, an Energizer Holdings spokesperson told Manufacturing Dive in an email.
Dive Insight:
Workers at both facilities were told Energizer planned to offshore manufacturing jobs to Singapore and a non-union plant in North Carolina, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters said in March.
Teamsters Local 695, which represents workers at the Fennimore plant, negotiated with Energizer for an economic package to guarantee protections for 600 workers affected by the Wisconsin closures, according to the union’s announcement.
As part of the closure announcement, Energizer entered into an agreement with the labor union to provide a package that includes severance, health insurance coverage and job placement assistance, an Energizer spokesperson told Manufacturing Dive in an email.
“As we’ve said from day one, we will continue to focus on our colleagues – the people closest to this issue and who matter most,” the Energizer spokesperson said.
The package secured by the Teamsters includes a stipulation that Energizer retain a majority of union workers early to mid-2024, providing the laid-off employee a one-week salary for every year they worked at the plant at a minimum of $5,000 and two months of COBRA healthcare coverage.
“While I’m glad that Energizer agreed to what we were asking for, our intent is to never use this agreement,” Teamsters Eastern Region VP Rocco Calo said in March. “We will continue to fight Energizer’s reckless plans to close these plants and offshore U.S. jobs to Asia.”
The equipment from the Fennimore and Portage plants will be relocated to Energizer’s other manufacturing facilities in the U.S., an Energizer spokesperson told Manufacturing Dive in May. Energizer announced plans at the time to spend $43 million to upgrade equipment and hire more workers at its battery production and packaging facilities in Asheboro, North Carolina.
