LONGWOOD ELASTOMERS IN BRENHAM TO CLOSE
A manufacturing facility in Brenham is shutting its doors.
Representatives for Longwood Elastomers confirm the decision to close the location at 1901 Longwood Drive.
Mike Diserio, Communications Director for Wabtec Corporation, which Longwood is a subsidiary of, said, “Decisions like this are never easy but it was made in response to changing market dynamics and an opportunity to better optimize our manufacturing footprint to improve cost competitiveness.”
According to Diserio, the closure will be done in phases over the next 12 months. Some production work in Brenham will transition to Wabtec’s other Longwood facility in Wytheville, Virginia.
Diserio said approximately 50 hourly employees will be impacted. Wabtec is providing affected employees with a range of resources and benefits to assist them through this transition.
The company manufactures rubber and thermoset components used in oil and gas, rail, industrial and other transportation market applications.
Once a proud member of the Washington County and SE Texas business community. Murray Rubber, Mead, Gates Molded, Longwood Elastomers all great companies but all good things must end or at least change. I mixed some of the first rubber batches there and at Milby Street in the oil patch boom days for old man Murray. Memories cherished even time can’t steal from us.
Y’all complain too much. Look at the big picture.
Bye, we just had a big new factory built east of town and the old MIC-West plant got filled by some company from California. Things are always changing and always will but we are doing okay right here.
Steve, if we keep building subdivisions mostly for all the retirees moving here then there will be jobs in construction and everything else that comes with more rooftops. It’ll work out. It always does. Just need to support BISD and Blinn so our workforce gets what it needs for the jobs that are out there and hopefully pay much better than the ones lost.
Oldtexan, oil production in the US topped out at 13.0 million bpd in November 2019. Then COVID came and it dropped to 9.7 million bpd in May 2020. The most recent figure is 13.3 million bpd in November 2023, a new record. Natural gas production now routinely hits record monthly highs and is up by about 29% from then. We’re getting another huge gas pipeline through Washington County and it wouldn’t get built if they didn’t think that they’d be able to fill it with even more gas production per day than there already is.
Thoughts and prayers for those that are going through a layoff right now. Hang in there, but Brenham and Texas are going to be okay.
But K tever and Steve, I would agree that we do need to be careful about China or any foreign power or straw buyer acquiring ownership of critical industrial production like all of what’s owned by GE which owns Wabtec which owns Longwood to shift around supply chains and create bottlenecks that flow through them. That is a real national defense concern! China is not our friend and needs to be watched very carefully. This should be a much bigger political issue than Taylor Swift at the Superbowl.
Wonderfully stated sir!
Great job!
Another 50 people on the street thanks to “reverse economics”. Some CEO or Board of Directors trying to squeeze even more profits out of a ringed out towel. GREED…not a good look. Id pass a law that in order to sell ypur products in the US, you must produce the products here
So sad to hear, we can’t compete with china because of our outrageous tax burden, and cost of living, something has to change
Hopefully someone will come in and buy them out.
Another victim of shutting down energy production in this country
Like they say a recession is when your neighbor loses their job a depression is when you lose your job. We need serious changes in our leadership in this country. My prayers are with those hourly workers that they are treated fairly and find new work soon or retirement is offered. So where are the jobs for the people if we keep building these subdivisions?
I’m not surprised to see this. This place was forever trying to hire at 14.50/hour for machine operators which is less money than a 16 year old high school kid makes working their first job grabbing shopping carts in a Walmart parking lot. Businesses in Brenham are not keeping up with the times and act like it’s way back in 2015 when it comes to wages. I wonder what the local City Council be others are doing to attract new large scale technologically advanced employers into the county. Doing that is what needs to happen or else I can foresee more of things like this happening.
Hey Ernest this isn’t Houston. Non of the businesses here pay top wages. I’ve worked several jobs in Brenham and was glad to have them. You want competition then you have to move to the big cities. We don’t want to be Houston, that’s why we left it. Houston , Dallas is where you build your future. You move here with a plan to improve Brenham and not complain.
Brenham was a great place for manufacturers to locate when the local businesses were able to work together to keep labor rates below state average. Now that Brenham is growing, it will quickly lose its allure for businesses that want ridiculously cheap labor. There will be more closures, and I say good riddance. Let another community volunteer to host and subsidize a manufacturer that keeps its workers living in poverty.
I couldn’t agree more. Burn the bridges and send the cheap labor mongers packing. Anyone can go onto indeed and view wages being offered. Keep in mind that Home Depot, Walmart, etc. all pay 15+ per hour and offer really good benefits. If a company is offering less than the basic retail environment then they deserve what they get. Toss a couple of bucks on top of 15 an hour to appease is pretty easy to see through. It’s insulting.