A piece of Werner Co. is going south of the border.

The company said Tuesday it will house a ladder parts plant in Juarez, Mexico. It will begin operating later this year and employ 50. An undetermined number of jobs at the company's Sugar Grove Township ladder plant will be moved to the Mexican operation, Werner said.

Parts produced at the foreign plant will be shipped to other Werner ladder plants for assembly. This is part of Werner's strategy to relocate jobs to lower labor and manufacturing operations, said John Guyton, Werner's director of human resources. He noted that other ladder makers are already building and buying ladders in Mexico and China.

In March Werner said it was shuttering the local ladder operation, resulting in nearly 500 local jobs being lost, after United Steelworkers Local 3713 nixed $11-an-hour concessions needed to make the plant competitive with other Werner facilities. Local 3713 represents production and maintenance workers at the plant.

At the time, Werner said it had to be competitive with other ladder producers who were using foreign operations. The company noted that labor costs in Mexico were in the range of $2 to $4 an hour, while Chinese labor costs ran about $2 an hour.

Phil DeMatteis, former president of Local 3713 and a current union member, said the decision was all based on money.

"They're making a profit and they want to make more of a profit," he said.

There was no point at which Werner said it would refrain from setting up foreign operations, Guyton said.

"It's not like we're going back on our word,'' he said.

Lee Basilotta, Werner's Greenville Division general manager, has been tapped as vice president of operations, planning and integration for the Mexican plant.

Ladder production at the local plant has ceased and jobs have been moved to Werner plants in Chicago and Anniston, Ala. Permanent layoff notices have been sent to 240 workers at the ladder plant, including 180 who had already been on temporary layoff.

Werner is keeping its aluminum extrusion operation and its company headquarters, all of which employ 500, in Sugar Grove.

With 2,300 total employees, Werner is a leading manufacturer and distributor of ladders, climbing equipment and ladder accessories. The company is owned by Investcorp, which is composed of Persian Gulf investors.

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