Almost 200 employees will be affected by the closure in St. Paul, Minnesota. | LookerStudio/Shutterstock
Smurfit Westrock is closing plants in Minnesota and Texas and is in discussions to do the same at two others in Germany, affecting around 650 employees total.
According to an April press release from the company, the St. Paul, Minnesota facility manufacturers coated recycled board, while the Forney, Texas facility makes containerboard.
The closure comes as part of a larger streamlining and decentralization the company announced in February, that will lay off 1,000 employees globally. The recently announced closures will shrink the company’s containerboard and coated recycling board capacity by more than 500,000 tons, it said.
The announcement also came shortly after the packaging and containerboard company reported more than $7.6 billion in net sales in the first quarter of the year, more than twice the same time period a year before but with a slightly narrower net income margin by percentage.
“While closing facilities is never an easy decision, it is based on a realistic expectation of current and future capacity needs, operating costs and an unrelenting focus on improving our business,” CEO Tony Smurfit said in a written statement. “We are very grateful for the significant contributions made by the teams at these locations over the years and we will do all we can to support them throughout this process.”
Smurfit Westrock, formed from the merger of Smurfit Kappa and Westrock less than a year ago, is one of the world’s largest companies of its kind and also a major user of recycled fiber, consuming around 14 million tons of it each year, according to the company’s 2024 sustainability report. That’s a little more than half of all fiber it consumed. The company also runs more than 60 of its own recovered fiber mills.
The St. Paul facility is one of four in the Twin Cities area and manufactures “a range of containerboard liners and flutings for the sustainable manufacture of corrugated board and packaging,” per the company’s website. It employs almost 200 people. Smurfit Westrock in a force-reduction notice to Minnesota said the closure is expected to be permanent and will begin on or within two weeks of June 30.
In Forney, meanwhile, the company will discontinue production at a containerboard converter plant but keep the specialty coating facility at the same location open, it said. It has two facilities in town, the containerboard facility and a mill that manufactures 100% recycled liner and medium board.