MetroGroup to close Rutland plant
End of mailing facility will leave 204 jobless
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By Brent Curtis and Louis Porter Herald Staff - Published: October 12, 2007
MetroGroup, Rutland County's eighth-largest employer, will close its Rutland plant in December, leaving 204 workers to find new jobs and subtracting another manufacturing business from the economically challenged region.
The bulk mailing facility on Seward Road in Rutland Town has been in operation since the early 1960s when it opened under a different name and different ownership as a support facility for Readers Digest. During its 45-year history, the plant has changed ownership a number of times, most recently in 2004 when it was bought by Marketing Services Inc., based in Lincoln, Neb.
An official for MetroGroup in Nebraska said Thursday the company was closing its Rutland shop and consolidating its operations into plants in Nebraska and Iowa to keep pace with changes in the industry.
"This addresses industry-wide issues," said Mike Shea, vice president of human resources for MetroGroup. "Things like the latest postal increase have affected how our customers do business."
Shea said the 175,000-square-foot plant in Rutland would shut down between Dec. 10 and Dec. 24 so the consolidation could coincide with the business schedules of MetroGroup's customers. The state has not gotten official notice of the closure of the Rutland facility, but under federal rules that would likely not be required until 60 days before the doors were shut.
Workers driving out of the plant Thursday wore grim expressions. The one employee who stopped to talk to reporters said workers had been instructed not to talk to the media.
A number of local economic development officials spent the day wondering what had driven the company to make the sudden and unexpected move, and more than a few were unhappy about the abruptness of the announcement.
"The first thing I asked them is whether the workers they told this morning knew something was going on or if it was a bomb," said Stan Rhodes, Rutland Town Select Board Chairman, who met with a representative from MetroGroup's corporate office Thursday. "He said it was a bomb."
"Then I asked him if there was any way to talk them into staying and he said 'no,'" Rhodes added.
But Shea said the decision to close the plant had nothing to do with the region or the state and he praised the workers at the plant.
"The community was great to us and it's very important to us to exit the Vermont community in the right way," he said.
Such praise might be considered cold comfort for the plant's workers, most of whom earned between $10 to $18 an hour working on the production floor.
But Shea said the company was taking a number of steps to ensure that as many workers as possible aren't left with nothing just before Christmas.
During a conference call Thursday with officials from the state Department of Labor, the Rutland Region Chamber of Commerce and the Rutland Economic Development Corp., Shea said he and other MetroGroup officials laid out a plan for transitioning the plant's workers into other employment.
On Oct. 24, the company will hold a job fair at the Seward Road site, where a number of regional employers will be on hand to talk about job openings in their companies. The state Department of Labor is scheduling another local job fair next month.
Tom Donahue, executive director of the Rutland Region Chamber of Commerce, said his organization and REDC would work with MetroGroup and other regional employers during the next two months.
Donahue said that by late afternoon Thursday, the Department of Labor had identified 88 jobs that would be open in the region during the next two months, and Vermont Country Store plans to hire 100 new workers to seasonal positions soon.
Links on the front page of the Chamber's Web site can connect workers to a number of job search engines.
"There's going to be a lot of hand-holding going on," Donahue said. "We all have to be matchmakers to find jobs for these people."
JoAnn Hollis Graffam, executive director at REDC, said her organization, dedicated to supporting regional businesses, will be on the phone constantly during the next few weeks calling on local businesses to attend the two job fairs.
"First and foremost we need to help transition people," she said. "We're going to be helping to get the word out."
Severance packages will be given to workers unable to find new employment by the time the plant closes, Shea said.
Finding jobs for the displaced workers only fills part of the void left by the company's relocation.
Local development and municipal officials said they don't want to let the manufacturing plant sit empty and idle for long and they said it would take help from the state to fill the void.
"The message coming out of this to the state of Vermont is 'We need your help,'" said Donahue, who placed calls to local legislators and Lt. Gov. Brian Dubie on Thursday. "If there are opportunities out there, we need them to pay attention to Rutland. This whole thing was out in the community today like a hurricane blew through. We've had too much bad news lately. We need to turn this thing around."
MetroGroup's announcement comes three months after OMYA announced it was relocating its headquarters to Cincinnati, Ohio, removing 50 high-paying jobs from the region.
That subtraction was fresh on the mind of Rutland Mayor Christopher Louras, who said Thursday he planned to work with the Chamber and REDC to persuade the state to lend a hand.
"Tomorrow I'm calling (Graffam) to see what we can do about filling that space," he said. "And I'll be calling the governor's office on down to see what the state can do. Especially because it's coming on the heels of OMYA, this is a big hit to the region. It highlights the fact that our economic engine isn't just retail and restaurants. We still need to rely on the industrial side."
Staff at the governor's office said they were well aware of Rutland's need.
"The governor has been briefed on this announcement and has asked the Department of Labor and Department of Economic Development to coordinate a response that puts the impacted workers first," said Jason Gibbs, spokesman for Gov. James Douglas. "We'll use all available resources to assist these workers in finding new opportunities."
Jim Greenwood, director of workforce development for the Vermont Department of Labor, said the agency was preparing to help workers at the facility.
The Department of Labor begins a "rapid response" in such situations, he said.
"We put a team together made up of unemployment insurance people, our Department of Labor people and in some cases others, like the state's human resources people," he said. "We offer assistance in filling out unemployment insurance claims, finding out if there are veterans there who would qualify for veterans' benefits."
"We want to make sure people get some money flowing through unemployment insurance as soon as possible," Greenwood said.
The state also helps employees with resumes, job applications and using the state's employment Web site, vermontjoblink.com.
"We certainly hope we can be of service to the employees and we will do everything we can to quickly get them back to employment," Greenwood said.
David Mace, spokesman for the Agency of Commerce and Community Development, said the decision to close the Rutland office seems to be part of a corporate restructuring effort and had little to do with factors under the state's control.
"Our first concern is for the workers and addressing their immediate needs. Getting them back to work is our secondary goal," he said.
Direct mail companies are under pressure because of increasing postal rates, competition from Internet advertisers and increasing regulation, Mace said.
"We understand there may be opportunity for a very small number of Rutland employees to be relocated to one of the other facilities, but that number is fairly insignificant," he said.
Contact Brent Curtis at brent.curtis@rutlandherald.com.
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