Due to high costs, tyre maker Sumitomo Rubber announced recently it will close its western New York tyre manufacturing plant and eliminate all 1,500 union and salaried jobs by 2025.
The Japanese company said attempts to control costs, along with investments in the ageing facility, had failed to offset mounting financial losses.
“The plant closure is primarily due to overall facility performance within the increasingly competitive international tyre market. This difficult decision follows a multi-year analysis of the company’s financial situation and general market conditions,” Sumitomo said in a statement.
Efforts to save the Tonawanda plant, near Buffalo, included trying to find a buyer for it, the company said, but there were no offers.
Sumitomo had recently invested US$140 million in the facility, including US$129 million in 2022, according to Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz.
The plant opened in 1923. Sumitomo took full control of it in 2015 after parent company Sumitomo Rubber Industries ended a joint venture with Ohio-based Goodyear Dunlop Tires North America.
The company said it was working with United Steelworkers Union Local 135 on severance packages.
Although tyre production has ended, overall operations will wind down over the next one to two years, the company said. Production will be transitioned across the company’s existing global footprint.