On Thursday, we were just like everyone in Newton County — shocked, saddened and worried — when we received the news that La-Z-Boy decided to shut down its upholstery plant at La-Z-Boy South in downtown Newton.
Initially, based on the press release that went out, it seemed like the whole location in downtown Newton was going to be gone, but as we read on and after talking with general manager Danny Simoneau, we realized it wasn’t the worst-case scenario.
Thankfully, Simoneau said that around 170 manufacturing jobs are returning to the workforce after La-Z-Boy announced a company-wide shutdown on March 27.
We know it sounds like a broken record, but these are unprec edented times. The coronavirus pandemic took a healthy demand for La-Z-Boy furniture to almost nothing two months later.
A large part of that is due to the shutdown, not just of La-Z-Boy and its stores, but of the entire economy. For just over a month, Mississippi was shut down except for essential businesses, such as grocery stores, essential medical staff and other essential businesses. The only business happening at many of these brick-and-mortar businesses is due to online shopping or calling ahead and picking up curbside.
Some businesses flourished during the downtown — grocery stores, restaurants that were well equipped to handle a high-demand of take out or drive-through business and those offering services that didn’t require going to an office.
However, during an economic downturn, the market for what La-Z-Boy was selling saw an all-time low demand.
Prior to the downturn, La-Z-Boy was working six days a week to catch up to the number of orders they had. Perhaps we will get back there. If that happens, maybe La-Z-Boy’s corporate officials will consider reopening the upholstery plant and give us back some of the jobs we lost.
It’s unlikely that we won’t see all of those 300 jobs come back. That is going to have a huge impact on our economy. That’s good-paying jobs with good benefits. Those workers, some of whom came from outside areas, came here and spent money here before and after their shifts. They paid income taxes that go into the state’s general fund budget. Some of that money comes back to the state and local levels.
The news is bad, but it definitely could have been worse. We could have lost the entire workforce, and the La-Z-Boy South would be sitting empty.
Perhaps we overreacted by shutting down the economy, or perhaps the short-term shutdown might have saved us from an even worse fate.
If any of you have been affected by the cuts, we hope that you will find good work in this area. And thank you La-Z-Boy for staying here.
