A Nashville manufacturing plant is closing and 75 jobs will be eliminated, as paint and coatings giant AkzoNobel winds down its powder coatings factory in the city by the end of 2026. The company says the move will not touch its separate Nashville regional headquarters, where more than 117 employees handle sales, marketing, finance and other business-support work.
According to WKRN News 2, the announcement applies only to the Powder Coatings manufacturing plant in Nashville, with the headquarters operation left untouched. AkzoNobel, the maker of Dulux paint, says current production volumes will be absorbed by its powder coatings manufacturing sites in Reading, Pennsylvania; Warsaw, Indiana; and Monterrey, Mexico. The company does not expect the Nashville plant closure to interrupt supply to North American customers, the outlet reports.
Part of a Broader Industrial Overhaul
AkzoNobel frames the Nashville shutdown as part of its 2023 Industrial Excellence program, which the company says focuses on optimizing operations and reducing complexity. Per the same account, AkzoNobel's own strategy materials describe the broader push as one concentrated on footprint consolidation for Industrial Coatings in North America, with the goal of rationalizing, upgrading and optimizing its industrial network to improve competitiveness, according to AkzoNobel. The company has separately said that site closures tied to this effort are the first part of a multi-year industrial efficiency plan to be fully finalized by the end of 2026, as detailed in a company release.
The Nashville cuts land alongside similar moves abroad. AkzoNobel has also announced the intention to close manufacturing sites in Groot-Ammers in the Netherlands, Cork in Ireland, and Lusaka in Zambia, according to PCI Magazine, with production from those sites also set to transfer elsewhere in the region under the same multi-year plan. Trade outlet Chem Manager reports that the broader strategy is meant to concentrate output at larger, more cost-efficient units.
Headquarters Jobs Stay, But Sector Faces Headwinds
The timing comes as AkzoNobel awaits European Union approval to merge with its U.S. peer, Axalta Coating Systems, in a deal the Nashville station's report values at $25 billion. The closure also arrives amid a broader slowdown in the state's chemical manufacturing sector: chemical manufacturing jobs in Tennessee slipped 2.6% over the past year, according to August data from the Tennessee Department of Labor and Workforce Development cited by the station.
Even as it trims its Nashville manufacturing footprint, AkzoNobel has pointed to growth elsewhere in the same business line. The company is making a $30 million investment to expand its North American Powder Coatings business, according to the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce, which notes the company is citing rising demand for powder coatings across sectors including architecture, automotive, agriculture, construction, appliances and furniture.
Tennessee WARN Notice Requirements
Tennessee's Department of Labor and Workforce Development says the federal WARN Act generally requires employers to give 60 days' notice ahead of covered plant closings, mass layoffs or a sale of a business, according to the state workforce agency. Separate guidance from the agency describes the federal mass-layoff test as covering 50 or more full-time employees if they constitute at least one-third of a site's full-time workforce, or 500 or more employees; it also says Tennessee employers with 50–99 affected employees are typically required to file, per state workforce support materials.
The Nashville plant closure also follows a pattern of cost-cutting that has played out across AkzoNobel's global operations in recent years. For now, the roughly 117 employees at AkzoNobel's Nashville headquarters are expected to keep their jobs, even as the 75 positions tied to the manufacturing plant are eliminated.
