Carlisle Co. Cites Chinese Competition as it Looks to Exit Tire Business

August 16 -- Charlotte-based Carlisle Cos. is looking to exit the business on which it was founded nearly 100 years ago, citing “price-aggressive” Chinese competitors driving down its profit margins.

Started in 1917 in Carlisle, Pa., the company has its roots in selling inner tubes for automobiles. Since then, Carlisle, which employs about 40 at its Ballantyne headquarters, has expanded into other manufacturing lines, from airplane wiring to restaurant plates, including the ones at Panera Bread.

Last month, while releasing second-quarter earnings, the company described its transportation products segment as “no longer a strategic asset.” The company said it was seeking a buyer for the segment, whose profit before interest and taxes is in the single digits compared with double digits in other Carlisle units. The segment makes speciality tires, including those found on all-terrain vehicles and boat and horse trailers, but not for use on automobiles.

“It was a very difficult decision because it’s the foundation of our company,” CEO David Roberts told the Observer in an interview.

But, he said, “If we are going to achieve our overall strategic financial objectives, it would have been very difficult to do that still owning the tire business.”

A year ago, Carlisle had told investors it expected the transportation products segment to be “a solid and consistent contributor going forward.” The company said in its 2012 annual report that the unit’s earnings grew by 476 percent amid lower costs after it closed tire factories in China and Pennsylvania.

But last month the company announced that it had hired SunTrust Robinson Humphrey, part of Atlanta-based SunTrust Banks, to help it with a sale of the transportation products segment. No buyer has been named yet.

Profit before interest and income taxes for the transportation products unit was 6.5 percent in the quarter, excluding a $100 million impairment charge, which resulted in a loss of $86.8 million before interest and income taxes.

The company has five business segments. Its construction materials segment makes roofing products. Another sector makes cable and wires for commercial and military aircraft. Another sells brake and friction systems used by the military and various industries. Another sector provides dishes, cookware and other supplies to restaurants and hospitals.

Carlisle had profit of $270 million in 2012, up 50 percent from $180 million the year before. The stock is up 14 percent since the start of the year, closing at $66.97 Friday.

The company says Chinese tire manufacturers, such as Kenda Tires, have made it hard for Carlisle to grow its profit margins for lawn and garden tractor tires – what Carlisle refers to as “outdoor power equipment.”

Carlisle makes those tires in the one factory it has left in China, benefiting from low labor costs. While labor remains cheaper in China, other costs – shipping, materials, warehousing – have gone up, making it just as practical to make the tires in the U.S., the company said.

The company said it tried to compete with the Chinese by lowering tire prices, which hurt profit margins, and cutting costs elsewhere, such as in reducing its number of distribution centers and plants. It wasn’t enough.

“While we are optimistic about the future for CTP, it is not core to Carlisle’s growth strategy,” the company said in its second-quarter report.

China has ‘really gone hard’

Roberts said the Chinese “have really gone hard” after the lawn and garden tire segment, “which really forced us to go ahead and make a decision to sell the business.”

Walter Weller, vice president of sales for Monrovia, Calif.-based China Manufacturers Alliance, said Carlisle’s plant in China should have enabled the company to compete.

“That’s the only thing that’s a little bit confusing,” said Weller, whose company is part of China-based Double Coin Holdings, which makes truck and heavy-equipment tires.

“The other thing to consider is that, in general, the tire industry is a ... capital-intensive business,” Weller said. “There’s a tremendous investment in equipment and factories and raw materials and everything associated with it.”

The sale of the transportation products segment will reduce Carlisle’s employment by one-third. Carlisle employs roughly 12,000 worldwide. Of those, about 4,400 work for the transportation products segment.

No Carlisle tires are made in Charlotte, so the company said it does not expect jobs in the region to be lost in a sale. The tires the company makes in China are assembled to wheels in a plant in Aiken, S.C., that employs 188 people. The company also has plants elsewhere in the U.S. One in Clinton, Tenn., makes tires for all-terrain vehicles.

While a new buyer might decide to shut down Carlisle wheel and tire factories, Roberts doesn’t think that’s likely.

“I think the buying company will want to keep those factories,” he said.

Chinese competition is not hurting Carlisle’s profit margins for other types of tires, Roberts said.

Roberts said Carlisle’s goal is to use the proceeds from the sale of the transportation products segment to buy a business with higher profit margins.

“If we can’t find one ... shortly after selling the tire business, then we would consider buying back shares,” Roberts said.

Deon Roberts           www.charlotteobserver.com 

Hiring Time at Carlisle

JACKSON, TN -- March 7 -- Carlisle Tire and Wheel will begin producing tires for the nation's agricultural industry inside the former Whirlpool-Jackson Dishwashing Products plant by June, said Russell Williams, plant manager.

The company is looking for maintenance technicians, assembly operators and other hourly workers. It also is looking for engineers in all fields, business analysts, cost accountants and several management positions, including quality control, materials flow control, and value stream managers.

Those who hope to work for the company should not go to the plant on F.E. Wright Drive. Instead, people seeking professional or management positions should send their resume to jaxrecruiting@carlisletire.com

Information on how to apply for hourly positions, such as assemblers, will be provided by the Tennessee Career Center at Jackson at a future date. An advertisement on when and where to apply will appear in The Jackson Sun at that time, Williams said.

Applicants for the hourly positions must take a test that is part of the National Career Readiness Certificate Program, said Daphne Johnson , human resources manager for the company. The test takes about three hours to complete. Details of when and where the test will be given will be announced later. It includes some English and mathematics skills, Johnson said.


"The test gives you an idea if you would be successful in a factory," she said.

The company expects to hire the first round of employees in April and will continue to hire workers in blocks until nearly all positions are filled within the next seven months. Company officials said the pay would be above the market wage but declined to specify.

"We will be 95 percent full by Sept. 1," Williams said.

Johnson said her company has received more than 600 resume and applications. “Hourly positions will be posted in The Jackson Sun as they become available,” she said.

“Hiring is being spaced out because training takes several months to complete,” Williams said.  "And that is tough to do in bulk.”

Plant employees will work one of three non-rotating shifts, five days a week.

Shift 1: 8 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Shift 2: 4 p.m. to midnight

Shift 3: Midnight to 8 a.m.

A multi-color floor plan of the plant hangs on the east wall of Williams' office. The layout is called "Road Map to 2014." It details the arrival of equipment, where it will be placed and what products it will manufacture. Names of cities, such as Opelika, Ala., are written under squares and rectangles designating the origination point of the equipment. Multi-colored dates written under those city names give the expected arrival dates.

By 2014, the company will occupy all but about 10,000 square feet of the 600,000 square-foot building.

"This is the most aggressive plan I have ever seen," said Williams, who also worked at Mark IV Automotive in Lexington.


Charlotte, N.C.-based Carlisle Companies is consolidating its operations in Jackson from three plants in Pennsylvania, Alabama and China. The company purchased the former Whirlpool plant for $7 million last fall, according to the Madison County Register of Deeds. Williams said he did not know how much the company will spend on equipment and other capital investments at the plant.

Some of that expense comes from readying the facility for manufacturing equipment that is larger and heavier than Whirlpool's.

Jackson Energy Authority is helping Carlisle install a larger electrical transformer to help pull and regulate a larger electrical load than was needed by Whirlpool. The energy authority also is installing a 6-inch natural gas line. The line will supply boilers that create steam used to cure the company's tires.

H&M Construction workers and architects are installing heavy-duty concrete pads to support Carlisle's equipment. The company also is digging about five trenches to submerge a portion of the incoming curing equipment.

Employees will work at ground level rather than on platforms, which is safer, Williams said.

Company President Fred Sutter said previously that Carlisle chose the Whirlpool building because its U-shaped layout allows for expansion. Sutter said his company could put a roof over the section that is now the U's open end, where the plant's 31 loading docks are located. That area could house more equipment and allow for increased production. That expansion plan, however, is only a thought at this time.

Safety lights are now about the only illumination inside the plant, which is big enough to hold several 747 airliners . Footsteps of Carlisle's employees echo across the plant's concrete floor, which is void of equipment and products for now.

But at the plant's east end, in an area smaller than a football field, workers now are assembling soil compacting wheels used in farm seeding equipment. The wheels fold and compress topsoil over seeds after they are planted. The wheels are being assembled from parts shipped to the plant. Eventually, the product will be made entirely in Jackson.

"That is the part of the business we are moving back from China," Williams said.

The arrival of Carlisle comes as Madison County struggles with 11 percent unemployment as of December, according to the latest data available from the Tennessee Department of Labor and Workforce Development's Web site.

So far, Carlisle has hired 16 people, seven hourly and nine salaried, to manage incoming equipment, hire staff and assemble the compacting wheels.

One of those assemblers is 28-year-old Calvin Davis of Yuma. He lost his job at Lexington's Summit-Brantley Building Innovations a week before Christmas.

"It feels good getting a steady job this quickly," said Davis, a husband and father of two.

Davis recognizes that he is on the ground floor of a company that is establishing itself as a permanent part of Jackson.

"I'd like to be in management," he said, "I have a management background."

Williams and other Carlisle officials are anxiously awaiting a visit from John Deere's purchasing team on Tuesday and Wednesday. 

If Deere employees approve and certify Carlisle's soil compacting wheels, they will be shipped to the farm equipment manufacturer beginning March 15.

"Then from that point until September," Williams said, "we will bring more people and equipment into the plant."

Carlisle will begin manufacturing its second set of products in June. Those products include air-filled agriculture and construction tires and high-speed trailer tires for products such as boat trailers, recreational vehicles and implement trailers. The tires will range from 10 inches to 24 inches in diameter depending on the market, Williams said. The tires will be bias ply. The company will not manufacture radial tires for those products.