In this week's issue:

• Reynolds is snuffing out some smoking business.


• GMAC is closing 200 ResCap offices.


• Plus we report on company closures and layoffs in: California, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Virginia.

---

Up in Smoke

Reynolds American Inc. will be streamlining non-core business processes and programs at its largest subsidiary, R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. to allocate additional resources to strategic growth initiatives. In addition, Reynolds Tobacco is making a modification to its brand-portfolio strategy.

"In August, Reynolds American and R.J. Reynolds Tobacco began a comprehensive business analysis as the latest step in our ongoing process of evaluating the best ways to continue improving the performance, efficiency and competitive position of each company," said Susan M. Ivey, RAI's chairman, president and CEO. "Both companies reviewed all their business plans and activities - with Reynolds American focused on enhancing innovation and strategic insight across its operating companies, and R.J. Reynolds focused on freeing up additional resources to invest in growth by seizing opportunities to become faster, more flexible and efficient."

The changes they came up with are as follows.

Reynolds American is creating a new growth and innovations organization, which will focus on innovation, consumer and market insights, competitive assessment and maximizing trademark equity across RAI's operating companies.

The R.J. Reynolds Global Products Inc. was not part of the business analysis, but separately undertook a review of its strategic focus and resource allocation. As a result, several of GPI's current activities will be reassigned to other Reynolds American operating companies by year-end.

R.J. Reynolds Tobacco is modifying its portfolio strategy by designating its premium menthol Kool brand from a growth brand to a support brand. R.J. Reynolds will focus Kool's future marketing and promotional support to geographic areas where the brand demonstrates strong consumer appeal.

R.J. Reynolds is refocusing its investment in the premium menthol category on the Camel brand, which today is primarily known for its non-menthol styles. The company believes that Camel's strength provides significant opportunities in the expanding premium-priced menthol category, in which the brand currently has a small but growing position. Camel has long been the company's primary growth brand, based on the strength of its unique positioning and product line, taste signature and innovative marketing approach.

R.J. Reynolds has also launched other cost and complexity reduction initiatives that include supply-chain efficiencies, streamlining of processes and support functions, and additional outsourcing of non-core activities.

Approximately 570 full-time jobs within Reynolds American and R.J. Reynolds will be eliminated, which represents about 16% of those two companies' Winston-Salem, NC-based workforce and about 10% of the two companies' U.S. workforce. About 44% of those job eliminations were matched with employees who had expressed interest in leaving the companies through a survey. The majority of the job eliminations will occur between third quarter 2008 and year-end 2009, with a few transitions extending into 2010.

Employees of Conwood and Santa Fe Natural Tobacco Co., as well as R.J. Reynolds' production associates and trade marketing personnel outside Winston-Salem, were not included in the business analysis or impacted by these job eliminations.

CoStar Quick Facts on Tobacco Companies

Not counting tobacco retailers, CoStar shows 26 tobacco companies taking 3.36 million square feet. About 73% manufacture tobacco products, the remainder produce it. About 43% of the firms lease their space and 100% of the identified leased space comes up for renewal in 2011.

---

GMAC Closing ResCap Offices

GMAC Financial and its secondary-market residential mortgage lending subsidiary, Residential Capital have enacted a plan to significantly streamline its operation, reduce cost, adjust its lending footprint and refocus its resources on strategic lending and servicing. ResCap will close all of its 200 retail offices ranging in size from 2,000 square feet and 4,000 square feet.

In addition, the company is evaluating strategic alternatives for the GMAC Home Services business and the non-core servicing business. These collective actions will reduce the ResCap workforce by approximately 5,000 employees, or 60%. Approximately 3,000 employees will receive notification this month with the majority of the remaining 2,000 reductions expected to occur by year-end.

The workforce reductions will include a range of administrative and managerial positions. All eligible employees affected by the workforce reduction will be provided severance packages and outplacement assistance.

"While these actions are extremely difficult, they are necessary to position ResCap to withstand this challenging environment," said Tom Marano, ResCap chairman and CEO. "Conditions in the mortgage and credit markets have not abated and, therefore, we need to respond aggressively by further reducing both operating costs and business risk."

Other initiatives include ceasing loan originations through its Homecomings wholesale broker channel, curtailing business lending and international business activities, and right-sizing its staff.

---

Read Closures & Layoffs First

Receive notice when a new Closure & Layoffs column is published by receiving The Watch List newsletter. The Watch List is a powerful one-two-combination of both top-down macro analysis and bottom up micro real estate news, as well as valuable leads about companies expanding and contracting and property and loan investment opportunities. It is available for free by e-mail, which is the quickest way to review all of the news in the column as soon as it is published and link directly to the news and features you want. Just e-mail me your name, title, company, company business, city, state, and e-mail address. You can reach me by clicking on the byline above or e-mailing me at Mark Heschmeyer

---

Closures & Layoffs

Flexsteel Industries Inc. plans to close its New Paris, IN, recreational vehicle seating manufacturing facility at 72104 County Road 23 and end manufacturing operations at its Lancaster, PA, facility at 107 Pitney Road. Approximately 250 employees will be affected by this consolidation of manufacturing operations over the next two to three months.

Mattson Technology Inc., a Fremont, CA-based supplier of advanced process equipment used to manufacture semiconductors, implement a cost alignment plan that will eliminate approximately 80 positions, or about 14% of the company's global workforce. Manufacturing positions comprise approximately 50% of the positions impacted, primarily as a result of the company's efforts to expand outsourcing operations for systems that are currently manufactured in Germany.

The following future closings and permanent mass layoffs were reported in California.

• Activision Blizzard is laying off 38 employees at 100 N. Sepulveda Blvd., Ninth Floor, in El Segundo on Oct. 3 and started laying off 133 employees at 6060 Center Drive, 5th Floor, in Los Angeles on Sept. 13.


• Advanced Medical Optics is closing down and laying off 58 employees at 9701 Jeronimo Road in Irvine on Sept. 30.


• Allergan Medical is closing down and laying off 59 employees at 48490 Milmont Drive in Fremont on Oct. 10.


• AT&T Advanced Solutions Inc. is closing down and laying off 188 employees at 3675 T St. in Sacramento on Oct. 6.


• ATK Space Systems is laying off 41 employees at 250 Klug Circle in Corona and 30 employees at 9617 Distribution Ave. in San Diego on Oct. 6.


• Bay Meadows Race Course is closing down and laying off 40 employees at 2600 S. Delaware St. in San Mateo on Oct. 12.


• Glendale Memorial Hospital and Health Center is laying off 176 employees at 1420 S. Central Ave, in Glendale on Oct. 10.


• HSBC Auto Finance and HTS San Diego are closing down and laying off 284 employees at 5855 Copley Drive in San Diego on Oct. 10.


• I-5 Social Services Corp. is laying off 188 employees at 4491 W. Shaw Ave., Suite 100, in Fresno and 26 employees at 195 A Smoot St. in Mendota this month.


• Jeld-Wen Windows and Doors is closing down and laying off 126 employees at 4547 Frontier Way in Stockton on Oct. 7.


• Leggett & Platt is closing down and laying off 69 employees at 13151 Midway Place in Cerritos on Oct. 3.


• Lennar Homes LLC is laying off 10 employees at 5251 Office Park Drive in Bakersfield on Oct. 22 and 44 employees at 28460 Avenue Stanford, Suite 200, in Valencia on Oct. 1.


• Nextwave Broadband is laying off 67 employees at 12670 High Bluff Drive in San Diego on Sept. 22.


• Queen of The Valley Medical Center is laying off 90 employees at 1000 Trancas St. in Napa on Oct. 6.


• Sconza Candy Co. is closing down and laying off 80 employees at 919 81st Ave. in Oakland on Oct. 1.


• St Joseph's Medical Center - Comm. Home Care is closing down and laying off 76 employees at 7400 Shoreline Drive, Suite 4, in Stockton on Sept. 30.


• Syntax Brillian Corp. is closing down and laying off 86 employees at 20480 Brillian in City of Industry on Sept. 2.


• The Modesto Bee is closing down and laying off 155 employees at 1325 H St. in Modesto on Sept. 28.

The following future closings and permanent mass layoffs were reported in Connecticut.

• Scholastic Inc. is closing down and laying off 125 employees at 90 Sherman Tpke in Danbury with layoffs occurring through March 1, 2009.


• Worldwide Flight Services is closing down and laying off 74 workers at Bradley International Airport in Windsor Locks on Oct. 2.

The following future closings and permanent mass layoffs were reported in Florida.

• Allstate Insurance Co. has started laying off 173 workers at 800 Carillon Parkway, Suite 105, in St. Petersburg.


• Bulova Technologies has started laying off 67 workers at 3900 Sarno Road in Melbourne.

Simmons Bedding Co. is transitioning its Atlanta, GA, manufacturing operations at 1 Concourse Pkwy NE, No. 800, to the company’s facilities in Dallas, TX; Waycross, GA; and Charlotte, NC, this week. The move is part of an ongoing effort to optimize Simmons’ operations network in the Southeast. In 2004, Simmons opened a new, state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in Waycross, which has emerged as one of the top manufacturing plants in the Simmons network. This past April, Simmons reduced its Atlanta production to one shift and moved a portion of business to what is also a new, state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in Dallas.

The following future closings and permanent mass layoffs were reported in Kansas.

• Nu Wa Industries Inc. started laying off 111 employees at 3701 Johnson Road in Chanute.


• Superior Industries International Inc. has started laying off 600 employees at 1500 E. 27th Terrace in Pittsburg.

The following future closings and permanent mass layoffs were reported in Kentucky, but no layoff dates were specified.

• American Standards Brands is laying off 48 employees at 84 Industrial Park in Hager Hill.


• Atlantis Plastics is laying off 152 employees at 390 Community Drive in Henderson.


• Dakkota Integrated Systems LLC is laying off 85 employees at 12510 Westport Road & 2420 Chamberlain Lane in Louisville.


• Dana Holding Corp. is laying off 260 employees at 750 Black Branch Road in Elizabethtown.


• Dawahare’s of Lexington LLC is laying off about 450 employees at 1801 Alexandria Drive in Lexington.


• Panasonic Motor Co. is laying off 85 employees at 1150 Mayde Road in Berea.


• Walgreens - OptionCare Home Care is laying off 106 employees at 11403 Bluegrass Parkway in Louisville.


• Johnson Controls Inc. is laying off about 114 employees at 1400 Isaac Shelby in Shelbyville.

The following future closings and permanent mass layoffs were reported in Louisiana.

• AI -Shreveport LLC is laying off 91 employees at 7699 West Bert Kouns in Shreveport on Sept. 29.


• General Motors is laying off 200 employees at 7600 Gen Motors Blvd. in Shreveport on Sept. 26.


• Lockheed Martin Space Systems Co. is laying off 200 employees at 13800 Old Gentilly Road in New Orleans on Oct. 3.


• Magna Decoma International is laying off 62 employees at 7751 W. 70th St. in Shreveport on Sept. 29.


• Tango Transport Inc. is laying off 60 employees at 6009 Financial Plaza in Shreveport on Sept. 29.

The following future closings and permanent mass layoffs were reported in Massachusetts.

• Boston Herald is laying off 210 employees at One Herald Square in Boston on Oct. 1.


• CHF Industries Inc. is laying off 104 employees at 847 Pleasant St. in Fall River on Sept. 28.

The following future closings and permanent mass layoffs were reported in Michigan; layoff dates were not identified.

• Comcast is closing down and laying off 108 workers at 27800 Franklin Road in Southfield.


• Semperian is laying off 53 workers at 5700 Crooks Road in Troy and 48 workers at 900 N. Squirrel Road in Auburn Hills.


• GMAC ResCap is laying off 73 workers at 2600 Troy Center Drive in Troy.


• Johnson Controls Inc. is closing down and laying off 160 workers in Caro and closing down and laying off 106 workers in Heartland.


• Visteon is closing down and laying off 160 workers at 128 Spring St in Ypsilanti.


• Action Distribution is laying off 60 workers at 4120 Brockton Drive SE in Grand Rapids.

The following future closings and permanent mass layoffs were reported in Missouri.

• Cassens Transport Co. is laying off an unspecified number of employees at 2000 Mraz Lane in Fenton this month.


• Chrysler is laying off 1,004 employees at its North Plant in Fenton this month.


• EDCO USA is closing down and laying off 139 employees at 270 Ceebold Ave. in Nixa on Oct. 6.


• Mahle Engine Components is closing down and laying off 208 employees at 14161 Manchester Road in Manchester on Dec. 31.


• Petit Jean Poultry Inc. is closing down and laying off 465 employees at 900 N. Cedar St. in Buffalo on Oct. 2.

The following future closings and permanent mass layoffs were reported in North Carolina.

• Freightliner of Mount Holly LLC is laying off 675 employees at 1800 N Main St. in Mount Holly in October.


• Graphic Packaging International Inc. is closing down and laying off 98 employees at 1006 Norwalk St. in Greensboro in December.


• Hilex Poly Co. LLC, the world's largest plastic bag company, is closing its Mount Olive plant on Old Mount Olive Highway. The plant closure is part of a deliberate action to reduce market capacity for the production of plastic t-shirt bags, the company said.


• Swift Galey is closing down and laying off 282 employees at 1659 E Court St. in Marion next month.

The following future closings and permanent mass layoffs were reported in Pennsylvania.

• Siemens Medical Solutions USA started laying off 500 people at 51 Valley Stream Parkway in Malvern last week.


• Campus Door is closing down and laying off 142 employees at 1415 Ritner Highway in Carlisle on Oct. 26.

The following future closings and permanent mass layoffs were reported in Virginia.

• Chesapeake Hardwood Products Inc. is closing down at 201 Dexter St. West in Chesapeake and laying off 11 employees on Oct. 31.


• Computer Sciences Corp. is closing down at 1401 Wilson Blvd. in Rosslyn and laying off 62 employees on Sept. 30.


• International Bedding Group Inc. is closing down and laying off 71 employees at 880 W. Roslyn Road in Colonial Heights on Nov. 10.


• Kurz Kasch Wabash Magnetics is closing down at 1222 Seymour Drive in South Boston and laying off 49 employees this month.


• Spectrum Healthcare Resources is laying off 50 employees at the Naval Medical Center in Portsmouth on Sept. 30.


• WELLA Manufacturing of VA is closing its distribution center at 4491 Carolina Ave. in Richmond and laying off 60 employees on Nov. 14.

---

CoStar Columns

For news of companies with increasing space needs, see Expansions & Relocations, a weekly column of major corporate headquarters expansions and relocations.

For news of property financing and a listing of loans nearing their maturity, see Property Finance, a weekly column of commercial real estate finance news and loan leads.

For news of properties about to go through a change of ownership, see Under Contract, a weekly listing of properties to be sold or acquired.

For news of distressed properties, see Watch List, a weekly column of property and credit market conditions and real estate investment opportunities.

For development and construction news, see In the Pipeline.

For retail news including expansions, closings and mergers and acquisitions, see CoStar's Retail News Roundup.

For green building news from CoStar, see Green Lede.

---