Milwaukee Electric Tool Corp. will move its remaining manufacturing lines from Wisconsin to Greenwood, adding about 50 jobs, the company announced Wednesday.
The Greenwood plant already produces a line of saw blades of various sizes. Two similar lines of blades and one line of hole saws - now produced in Wisconsin, where the company is based - will be moved to Greenwood by the end of the year, plant manager Danny Temple said.
The new lines will double the plant's production. The number of employees, which was about 300 at the end of February, will grow to about 350.
Most of the people added will be technicians rather than hourly workers. With robotic equipment, usually an operator or technician can take care of a small problem, but if the problem is more serious, someone with a greater breadth of knowledge is needed, Temple said.
"You have to be very skilled in lots of different areas - with computers, with electronics, electrical, hydraulics, just about all the areas of maintenance," he said.
He said he was confident that the company will find qualified workers. The employees hired by the Greenwood plant so far have performed well, he said.
"We found a good supply of people that have done a first-class job," he said.
The company will hire about 20 people as soon as possible, and they will be sent to Wisconsin for two or three weeks of training on the equipment.
They will be trained by employees who are about to lose their jobs, but Temple said he didn't anticipate problems.
"Nobody likes losing their job, seeing their work go away," he said. "But I believe they will do the right thing; they will step up and be professional about it, and make sure that our guys get trained, that the equipment is transferred in good shape."
The addition of the blade manufacturing has occurred in stages.
A 50,000-square-foot expansion of the plant was completed last spring, and 75 employees were added as a result of it.
Later, the plant began painting Wisconsin-produced blades and hole saws, printing logos on them and packaging them. Those tasks previously had been done in Olive Branch, where Milwaukee Tool has a distribution center.
Then the company bought a new line to make blades in Greenwood. With that operation a success, the next step was to move all of it to one place, simplifying logistics and reducing inventory.
"It's the same stuff," Temple said. "It doesn't make sense to have part of it in Milwaukee and part of it here."
The machinery will be moved beginning in May. An outside company will be hired to disconnect, load, move and install it.
Milwaukee Tool is obtaining quotes now from companies in this area as well as Wisconsin to do that work. Whoever handles the dismantling will handle installation as well.
"It'll be a pretty big project," Temple said. "I'd say it'll pretty much keep them busy for the rest of this year, whoever it is."
Temple said the goal of starting the new lines this year is "aggressive" but feasible. Based on history, they have assembled a plan that they think will work, he said.
However, he added, a number of other variables are involved, such as transportation of items. If problems come up and customer service might be disrupted, then the move can be delayed, he said.
"We will not jeopardize a customer," he said. "If we have to delay part of the move or a next phase of that, then we'll do that in order to satisfy the customer."
Temple said this will be the last manufacturing move from Wisconsin, although administration, sales, marketing and some other offices will remain at the headquarters.
