A.O. Smith to eliminate 109 jobs by Christmas

There’s no holiday cheer at A.O. Smith.

Layoffs began Friday and company spokesman Mark Petraca said 109 people will lose their jobs before Christmas.

“The last thing we want is to lay people off,” said Petraca. “It’s unfortunate.”

The holiday timing was jarring, although the news was hardly unexpected. A.O. Smith has been steadily eliminating jobs for the past five years.

When this week’s layoffs are over, Petraca says the company will employ 172. That’s down from 925 employees in 2000.

“We’re moving some of our operations in a continuation of our reorganization,” said Petraca. “We’re in an extremely competitive field and this is one of the things that needs to be done for us to stay competitive.

“If there’s anything I can say, it’s that this company has always been upfront with our plans. As soon as we know something, we try to give people as much warning as possible. In this case, the people impacted have known since September.”

The local plant will continue to do lamination stamping and produce integral horsepower motors as its primary functions. Employees are bracing for even more layoffs next year, although Petraca says that has not been determined.

When asked if the local facility is in A.O. Smith’s long-range plans, Petraca said the company does operate some smaller plants but didn’t indicate that would be the case in McMinnville.

“We’re always looking at what we build and where we build it,” Petraca said. “And as soon as we know what we’re going to do, we’ll let our employees know.”

Not so festive
The holiday season hasn’t brought good news for some Warren County workers: