More downsizing for GEON

The region’s largest sheetfed operator continues its east coast consolidation, restructuring its Tempe and Brunswick operations with a loss of 15 staff.

The trans-Tasman print group is planning to relocate its entire Tempe warehouse staff into Parramatta in NSW and Eagle Farm in Queensland by February 2012. Brunswick is the most affected site, with only 35 staff from 50 transferring to Mt Waverley and Banksmeadow by 21 December 2011.

According to Graham Morgan, CEO of GEON, all redundant staff will receive full entitlements and around $3K in outplacement support.

“We are committed to providing our employees open and transparent consultation during this process as well as full support.

“All staff will have access to all internal opportunities as well as outplacement, external career counselling and job-search assistance on top of our internal HR team support,” he says.

Morgan adds that it is too early to tell what the final number of redundancies will be, until the one-on-one sessions with staff are complete over the next week.

The site closures and consolidation is in line with GEON’s target to offer single-site print operations along Australia’s eastern seaboard, maintaining its focus on operation and production efficiencies, press maximisation and cost reduction.

“GEON must continue to take actions to ensure that we utilise our full capacity across Australia whilst striving for lowest cost-to-serve. We need to build sustainable manufacturing sites across our footprint, align all of our processes and leverage from our efficiency gains and other business initiatives,” said Morgan.

The latest move follows the transfer of former Dynamic Press operation at Dee Why into Banksmeadow, and Docklands into Mt Waverley. Perth and Hobart sites are unaffected by the group’s geographical footprint review.