Terex’s Wilmington production facility to close

Since Terex acquired the 51,933m2 Wilmington facility in 1998 from industrial crane manufacturer American Crane, it has manufactured crawler cranes and tower cranes at the plant.

The move comes despite increased optimism within the North American crane market, as the industry reports increasing boom truck and rough terrain crane sales leading the recovery.

Over the past few years Terex Cranes has significantly increased its market share outside its core EU and US markets and currently regards customer demand in North America as too low to justify the current capacity of its Wilmington factory’s operations.

However, service and after-sales support operations for Wilmington-manufactured cranes will remain based in Wilmington.

Terex Cranes president Kevin Bradley said: “While the economy is beginning to improve, manufacturing capacity is greater than needed to meet foreseeable market demand.

“The decision to cease plant operations in Wilmington was not an easy one, because we know this action affects team members and their families. However, we have determined that discontinuing production at Wilmington is the right decision for our business as we continue to consolidate our manufacturing footprint, consistent with the needs of our global customer base.”

Closure of the plant will affect 90 Terex employees, among them 60 production engineers, who will receive severance pay and have employment contract terms honoured as well as assistance in finding new employment.