By Seth Leonard
Salisbury Post
The Wingfoot Tire Center located at 1405 Jake Alexander Blvd., formerly Goodyear, ceased off-the-road tire retreading operations today, resulting in the relocation or release of 26 employees.
Off-the-road tires are large, knobby tires used on construction, earth-moving and mining equipment.
The plant will continue its current operations, which include commercial truck and passenger car tire retreading. Off-the-road services will still be offered, but work will no longer be done in-house.
All off-the-road retreading equipment has been sold to Purcell Tire and Rubber Co., which will move the majority of it to its headquarters in Potosi, Mo.
The sale is a move by Wingfoot and parent company Goodyear to exit the off-the-road retreading business permanently.
With few subdivisions being built because of the housing market’s fall, demand for off-road tires has fallen too, one industry observer said.
According to public relations officer Jim Davis in Akron, Ohio, the closing of the Salisbury operation comes in conjunction with the closing of the company’s only other off-the-road retreading facility in Winona, Minn. Davis had no comment as to whether these would be the last of the changes at the local plant because of the cyclical nature of the industry.
Davis said employees laid off due to the changes received severance packages.
Purcell Tire operates more than 30 locations in 10 states, with no services in North Carolina. Company officials have not responded to telephone inquiries regarding the companies plans for expansion to the state.
The Tire Industry Association claims the retreading industry saves trucking companies nearly $2 billion in annual tire costs.
The Jake Alexander plant opened in 1968, and operations were taken over by Wingfoot in October 2000.