Briggs & Stratton Closing Georgia Plant, Affecting 475 Jobs
Friday, July 11th, 2014
Bucking a decadeslong trend that saw many manufacturing jobs migrate to lower-cost Southern states, Briggs & Stratton Corp. is closing a Georgia factory while adding 220 full-time jobs and 150 seasonal jobs at its Wauwatosa plant.
Briggs is closing a factory in McDonough, Ga., whose roots date back more than a century. Briggs acquired it in 2004 as part of its purchase of Simplicity Manufacturing Inc.
Briggs will move the factory's production of riding lawn tractors, pressure washers and snow throwers to Wauwatosa in 2015. The move will nearly double the company's manufacturing workforce at the plant, where employees are represented by United Steelworkers Local 2-232.
It will be the biggest jobs increase for Briggs in Wisconsin in years, according to the company.
