Oak Creek spice plant to close in December, laying off 88 workers

An Oak Creek spice plant will close later this year — just three years after the manufacturing facility was purchased by an out-of-state firm.

Asenzya Inc. was purchased by Solina USA in 2021, which has corporate offices in Illinois and California but is owned by a European company.

The company announced it would “cease operation” at the Oak Creek facility on Oct. 3, according to a layoff notice sent to the Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development on Oct. 7. Eighty-eight workers will lose jobs in the closure.

The job losses are permanent, and are expected to occur on Dec. 20, the notice said. The employees losing jobs range in positions from packaging and blending operators to the plant manager, according to the document. The affected employees were not represented by a union.

When the facility was sold nearly three years ago, it had more than 145 employees, according to the acquisition announcement. 

At the time, Solina said the purchase of Asenzya was part of a “strategy of expanding geographically through takeovers.” The parties did not disclose the transaction value.

In a statement, Solina spokesperson Kathy Lenkov said the decision to close the Oak Creek facility was “difficult” and made “due to business needs.” The spokesperson said there are no plans to cease production at the company’s other U.S. facilities.

“Regrettably, this will impact the employment of our valued production employees in Oak Creek,” Lenkov said. “The care of our employees is a priority, and the company does not take this business decision lightly.”

Lenkov says affected employees will receive severance pay and job search resources.

Despite layoffs, Wisconsin hasn’t seen a major rise in unemployment

As of August, the most recent month with local data, Oak Creek had an unemployment rate of 2.5 percent, according to the state Department of Workforce Development. Meanwhile, Milwaukee County had a 3.7 percent unemployment rate.

DWD layoff data shows at least 18 manufacturing plants across Wisconsin have had layoffs this year, totaling 1,583 job losses. Across all industries, 6,264 Wisconsin workers had been affected by layoffs as of Thursday. In all of last year, 7,393 workers in the state were affected by layoffs.

However, the state’s unemployment rate has remained near record lows since 2022. 

In August, Wisconsin had an unemployment rate of 2.9 percent, better than the country’s 4.2 percent unemployment rate that month, DWD data shows. More than 3 million Wisconsinites were employed.

In a May media briefing, DWD economist Dennis Winters addressed how the state’s jobless numbers have remained low despite some high-profile layoffs. He said the effects of those job cuts are felt locally, but they haven’t been enough to make a statistical impact on state unemployment. 

“Out of 3 million jobs, even a couple thousand jobs are small compared to everything,” he said.

As of August, roughly 481,600 Wisconsinites were employed in manufacturing, up from roughly 477,100 in the same month of 2023, according to data from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. In the same month of 2020, there were roughly 452,700 manufacturing jobs in Wisconsin, the data shows. 

Scott Hodek, an economist with the state Department of Workforce Development, spoke about the Wisconsin economy last month.

“We’re seeing it slow some, but it’s still slow growth — it’s not contraction,” he said. “We are still seeing the economy move forward. We do still have job growth and low unemployment rates.”

Last month, the U.S. unemployment rate ticked down to 4.1 percent as the country added  254,000 jobs in September, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Wisconsin-specific data for September has not yet been released by DWD.

In an Oct. 4 statement, acting U.S. Labor Secretary Julie Su said the September jobs report shows that the American economy “continues to thrive” and that “people who need a job are finding a job.”

“Four years ago, students were logging into school via Zoom, trick-or-treating was canceled, and we faced unprecedented challenges,” Su said. “Today, as we approach Halloween 2024, our economy is on strong footing with record employment gains, shrinking unemployment gaps, and rising wages.”