Plastron Industries Inc. is closing its Bensenville, Ill., manufacturing facility and moving production to a Plastron plant in Pfarr, Texas.
The shutdown, planned for May 31, will affect 71 workers at the 76,500-square-foot Bensenville site, which will be sold.
``Our customers - electrical equipment manufacturers - are down there,'' James Swartout, chairman and chief executive officer of parent firm Summa Industries, said by telephone.
About 10 other workers in engineering and sales functions will remain in the Chicago area.
In December, Summa said consolidation and restructuring initiatives would include the sale of several parcels of real estate by the end of August. Plastron makes molded plastic coil forms, known as bobbins, for use in transformers, motors, relays and switches.
David Frye sold the Pfarr operation to Summa in January 2004 as part of a technology collaboration. Now located near Pfarr, Frye and some associates are opening a Reynosa, Mexico, facililty to perform secondary operations using existing Plastron technology.
Torrance-based Summa employed 715 as of Oct. 29 and reported profit of $2.9 million on sales of $116.4 million for the fiscal year ended Aug. 31.
