Workers at Abbott Laboratories will get to keep their jobs for at least another year, thanks to increased short-term demand for the facility’s product.
“The timing of our closure has been pushed out 12 to 18 months,” Abbott Canada spokesman Eileen Murphy confirmed on Tuesday in a telephone interview from the Montreal head office of the multinational firm’s Canadian subsidiary.
Abbott Laboratories initially announced in September that it plans to close its Brockville Abbott Nutrition plant by September 2012.
The facility, at the corner of Pearl Street East and North Augusta Road, employs 158 people full-time and produces the nutritional formula Ensure and Similac baby formula.
Murphy said that closing date has now been postponed to late 2013 or early 2014.
“There will be no impacted jobs through the end of 2012,” said Murphy.
After that, the layoffs are expected to happen in “a phased approach,” added Murphy, who could not provide a more specific timeline.
She said the decision to delay the closure is the result of increased “near-term or short-term demand” for the facility’s products.
“We just sort of felt the change and adjusted accordingly.”
But Murphy said there is no prospect of the plant remaining open indefinitely should demand remain at that increased level.
The firm is sticking to its plan, but merely stretching out the timing, said Murphy.
The decision comes as city officials have been eager to market the east-end plant to prospective new tenants.
City officials believe the Abbott property will be easier to sell to other companies because it is a “food-audited” building, and the city’s workforce is skilled in the food sector.
The building meets the high standards of purity and cleanliness required by the food manufacturing industry because it is completely sealed, economic development director Dave Paul noted earlier this year.
He said at the time the same strict compliance with cleanliness standards will make the property attractive to the biotech sector and even a brewery.
That made Tuesday’s good news a mixed blessing for Brockville Mayor David Henderson, since the process is still ending with the plant’s closure, but temporarily derailing efforts to bring in a new permanent employer.
“It’s a mixed bag,” said Henderson.
“It’s such a good building. There is some interest in it.”
On the other hand, the delay in closing the facility does buy some time.
“Another year out, there’s always a chance they might change some of their decision-making,” said the mayor.
“It’s good news. They’re good jobs. They put a lot of money back into the community.”
An employee at the Brockville plant, approached by a reporter, declined to comment on the matter Tuesday evening, adding workers have been told to refer all questions to senior management.
An earlier call to the plant’s general manager was referred to Murphy at head office.
With files from Nick Gardiner. ronz@recorder.ca
