Eric Strauss//February 23, 2015//
Eric Strauss//February 23, 2015//
A maker of cosmetic pencils and other products is consolidating a pair of New Jersey facilities in Tennessee, resulting in the loss of 111 jobs in the Garden State.Schwan Cosmetics USA Inc. says it is closing facilities at 21 Gordon Road and 110 Ethel Road in Piscataway, and transferring their operations to a new facility in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. About 28 percent of the company’s New Jersey employees opted to move west, it said, with the 111 layoffs representing the rest.
Schwan, which issued a WARN notice about the jobs effective April 24, said the workers opting not to move will be provided with incentives to remain with the company through the transition point, as well as outplacement services to assist them in finding new jobs.
The Murfreesboro site will consolidate Schwan Cosmetics USA’s New Jersey operations as well as the Schwan Cosmetics Cosmolab facility in Lewisburg, Tennessee, the company said. When announced in November 2013, the facility was projected to cost $38 million and create 250 jobs over five years, as well as bringing in 200 jobs from the Lewisburg site.
“Both our New Jersey and Tennessee manufacturing facilities will be consolidated into this 173,000-square-foot high-tech site,” Barbara Bauer-Kropf, Schwan’s executive vice president of sales, said in the news release announcing the Murfreesboro plan. “The new Schwan Cosmetics USA will be a full-service private-label supplier continuing to build on Schwan Cosmetics’ heritage of developing and introducing innovative, market-driven color cosmetics.”
The Tennessee site will include manufacturing, research & development, and sales operations, Schwan Cosmetics said. Schwan said it received tax incentives from the local community and training funds from the state of Tennessee tied to the consolidation.
Schwan was not able to provide any information on whether New Jersey offered any incentives for the company to stay.
Schwan Cosmetics USA is a unit of the Schwan-STABILO group, based in Germany.
WARN notices normally cover mass layoffs or facility closings as part of the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act of 1989.
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