The following statement was issued by Grove Worldwide to the crane industry press on 8 September 2000:
Jeffry D. Bust, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Grove Worldwide announced that despite record years at National Crane and in the European organization, Grove has not met profitability targets for the third quarter due to declining platform sales and production inefficiencies at its Shady Grove operations.
Changes will be made in their operations including that approximately 260 employees are to be laid off today. The layoffs will include employees from all functions of the company and is an across the board reduction in the workforce. The previous reduced work schedule implemented by the company on August 14 will end and full time schedules will resume on September ll. This will also eliminate the need for the previously planned Manlift production shutdown for November 17 through January l, 2001. [*]
Most areas of the shop at Shady Grove, Pennsylvania will operate on a two shift rather than three shift schedule.
Bust noted: “It is no secret that the aerial work platform business today is extremely difficult for manufacturers and our Manlift business will have a significant loss this year. Our third quarter earnings were released on August 16. As expected, our poor financial performance disappointed our lenders. My commitment to our lenders is to resolve problems in the Manlift business and to improve the efficiencies of our Shady Grove operations in short order. I advised them that our crane business has been doing well overall, gaining market share and growing sales.”
Bust further commented that the Manlift business is being closely examined and all options are being explored in terms of possible partnerships with other aerial work platform manufacturers as well as returning it to profitability through lower production volumes, reducing sales, engineering and administrative costs and possibly downsizing the product line.
He also noted that the training center site in Blue Ridge Summitt has been listed for sale.
“This facility was originally instituted to serve as a place to host large group visits by distributors and potential customers in a setting which included lodging and dining facilities and also served as our training center. As the nature of doing business has changed, visitations by large groups and international delegations have diminished significantly in the past several years. More training is being done at customer field locations to save Grove customers’ time and expense. We have existing space at Shady Grove for our training operations and, with our new training group formed earlier this year, we can effect significant cost savings, efficiencies and better training capabilities by the sale of the center, getting out of the hotel and restaurant business and moving training to Shady Grove.”
* Footnote: These original plans are reported in the September 2000 issue of Cranes Today which went to press before this statement was released.
