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Briggs Relocating Yard Products Headquarters


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Briggs Relocating Yard Products Headquarters Briggs & Stratton is relocating the headquarters for the former Simplicity Mfg. from Port Washington, WI, to a site in Brookfield, WI. The move will result in the relocation of roughly 90 of the 500 employees of the former Simplicity operations, now called the Briggs & Stratton Yard Power Products Division, to a 26,000-square-foot office building across the street from Briggs' corporate headquarters. The move is expected to happen this fall. Yard Power Products Group president Vince Shiely said the relocation will enhance dealer and product support by giving the division access to resources available at the corporate headquarters.
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Step two in the slow death of our beloved Siomplicity. Soon to lie alongside Studebaker and many other faithful but scorned friends
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Woohoo! Woohooo! They are moving to my city! In college, we used to get drunk and "dumpster dive" at the end of the night for leftover curly fries from Hardees. Now I can get drunk and "dumpster dive" in for leftover and 'factory second' Briggs parts! Bob, you can join me...you may have to hoist me up on your back to look in to these big green treasure troves! Get ready Greg, we are gonna get rich selling stuff on e-bay!
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The way I read it is that headquarters will move but manufacturing will stay in Prt Washington. http://milwaukee.bizjournals.com/milwaukee/stories/2006/08/14/daily25.html
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Larry,I believe you're correct.It's usually something like this move,or a new "corporate" logo,or similar,that starts the slow death.
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Could be just trying to consolidate HR,accounting and such. Also might be so that multi-brand promotions could be planned together. I also heard there may be some Simplicities made in the snapper plant in GA in the near future. We can only hope Briggs continues the tradition that made Simplicity great.
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In today's electronic world there is no real reason to move to an address "across the street" to share resources. In my mind it is just an attempt for briggs to break the "culture" of Simplicity and impose their corporate "rules" on the new aquisition. Corporate mentality sometimes has little to do with reality or providing the best product to the consumer, it usually has to do with proving who is in control and protecting the empire the owners have built. My personal observations from my seat at work, working for a comapny that has been sold twice in two years. GregB
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quote:
Originally posted by goatfarmer
Larry,I believe you're correct.It's usually something like this move,or a new "corporate" logo,or similar,that starts the slow death.
Kinda reminds me of the last corporate buyout I went through. The new owners came in to address the employess and ensure everyone that they bought the company because it was successful and profitable, and if it aint broke, don't fix it. A little over a year later there were about 7 of the original 42 salaried employees left, myself included. When I left, there were only 3 of us in engineering and 1 in production management from the original group. :(
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Try this, Briggs sold off 20 acres on the south end of their main plant two years ago. Part of that acreage was a good sized two story assembly area for the aluminum engines and the lions share of that was walk behind lawn mower engine. When Briggs opened up other plants closer to their customers, that portion, I think became obsolete. There is a Lowes and maybe a resturant going up now. Also this isn't nearly the people working at the main plant as there were years past. There might be excess manufacturing capacity at the main plant and at some point in time the whole PW plant could move 35 miles south. I don't think Port Washington can expand any more and the whole idea does have some merit. That doesn't mean that I like it, but it is possible.
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quote:
Originally posted by BLT
Try this, Briggs sold off 20 acres on the south end of their main plant two years ago. Part of that acreage was a good sized two story assembly area for the aluminum engines and the lions share of that was walk behind lawn mower engine. When Briggs opened up other plants closer to their customers, that portion, I think became obsolete. There is a Lowes and maybe a resturant going up now. Also this isn't nearly the people working at the main plant as there were years past. There might be excess manufacturing capacity at the main plant and at some point in time the whole PW plant could move 35 miles south. I don't think Port Washington can expand any more and the whole idea does have some merit. That doesn't mean that I like it, but it is possible.
that must be the plant on 124th st, south of capital dr. in tosa your talking about? I heard about the lowes going in there.
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Hopefully change is good because Simplicity needs to regain some ground. My buddy dropped off the last of his older Simplicities to my house... he went new green... tired of breakage and figured his son can now cut the lawn. I think an arbor breaking in his deck set him off.
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