UPDATE: 116 jobs lost in Fort Wayne

FORT WAYNE, Ind. (WANE) - A Fort Wayne operation dating back to 1898 will soon be no more. Graphic Packaging at 102 West Superior Street will close in the middle of 2010.

The closure eliminates 116 jobs including 24 salaried management positions and 92 manufacturing employees.

NewsChannel 15 has learned that layoffs will begin in early January and will continue through the end of June.

The Fort Wayne plant manufactures folding cartons. Another Graphic Packaging plant in California is also closing. The company says it is not due to the economy, but instead to due to a recent merger.

Graphic Packaging and Altivity Packaging merged in 2008. The combined company then spent much of 2009 analyzing how to run the new company more cost-effectively.

Company officials tell NewsChannel 15 that those efficiencies include closing the Fort Wayne plant, citing several determining factors, like the facility’s age.

This announcement did not exactly come as a surprise according to a company spokesperson.

"When Graphic Packaging acquired Altivity in early 2008, we did announce at that time that we anticipated that there would be plant closures around redundancies within the system," SVP of Human Resources Cindy Baerman said.

While the decision to shut down was not economy driven, the jobs lost do have an economic impact on the City.

"We never like to see jobs leave Fort Wayne," Rachel Blakeman, spokesperson for the Mayor's Office said.  "Obviously [that has an] impact on individuals, their families and then the local economy."
 

The Superior Street plant dates back to 1898 when it started as Fort Wayne Box Company and originally produced gift boxes, postcards and calendars. Container Corporation of America purchased the facility in 1956 and produced folding cartons along with custom packaging.

In 1986, Jefferson Smurfit Corporation acquired the plant and sold the facility in 2006 to Altivity Packaging.