Published: May 01, 2008 10:37 pm            

Shaw to lay off 67, close finishing facility in Ringgold

Dalton-based Shaw Industries will lay off 67 employees and close its Ringgold carpet finishing department, according to Rick Hooper, the company’s chief counsel.

Hooper said the company hopes to place “as many as these folks as possible” at other Shaw Industries plants in the area. He added that workers will have their jobs for 60 days from last Monday when the layoff notice was sent to Gov. Sonny Perdue’s office.

“These are hard times,” Hooper said. “It’s just tough right now.”

Shaw Industries, like many other floorcovering companies, has faced struggles as sales have slumped due to a dip in the housing market and an overall economic slowdown. On Tuesday, Chattanooga-based Dixie Group announced plans to cut 8 percent of its 1,400-person work force. Earlier this month, officials with Calhoun-based Mohawk Industries said the company will lay off 366 workers and close a plant in Dahlonega.

“It really had to do with kind of the slowing business conditions,” Hooper said of the Ringgold layoffs. “That was the main reason for it.”

The carpet finishing department, or Plant 64, is inside a larger rug plant at 1081 Industrial Blvd. According to the state WARN (Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification) Act, if a company refers to any operation as a “plant” in a larger facility, whether it’s a room or a department, and the layoffs are a certain size, they must be reported.

“Because it was completely separate in the workflow, we called it Plant 64, but really it was a finishing department,” Hooper said.

Shaw Industries, the world’s largest tufted broadloom carpet manufacturer, has more than $5 billion in annual revenues and approximately 30,000 employees.

        

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