Weyerhaeuser Co. announce Closure and Sales of Plants in US and Canada

One of the world’s largest integrated companies of forest products, Weyerhaeuser Co. (WY.N) announced on Friday that it will be closing or selling some of its plants and to expect more changes in the future.

The factories that are going to be closed are manufacturing containerboard, packaging and paper bags.  This just one of the latest in a sequence of realignments that Weyerhaeuser Co. has planned.

The Federal Way headquartered in Washington will close their Plymouth, North Carolina plant permanently and 200 employees will be affected.  The factory manufactures 350,000-ton-per-year of containerboard.

Other corrugated packaging plants will be closed in the next few months.  They are located in Bedford Heights, Ohio; Elmira Heights, New York; Little Rock, Arkansas; and Matthews, North Carolina.

Pulaski, Tennessee and Waco, Texas will also close the corrugated sheet feeder plants.  The retail paper bag plant will close in Kansas City, Missouri.

There are four plants up for sale.  The corrugated sheet plants in Little Rock, Arkansas; Memphis, Tennessee; and Shreveport, Louisiana and the specialty packaging plant in Valley View, Ohio will soon be sold.  They did not specify who would be the potential purchasers.

Also announced is closure of two paper machines in Canada strictly due to supply and demand plus cost of manufacturing being too high.  There will be over 800 employees affected.