Key takeaways:
- A labor union said that Paccar is planning to lay off 175 people from its factory in Sainte-Thérèse, Quebec.
- Paccar's total employee count grew by almost 2,000 in 2024 to 30,100, but weaker demand is putting pressure on the manufacturer.
- Other truck manufacturers are similarly pursuing layoffs, including Volvo Group and Traton SE.
Paccar, the parent company of Kenworth and Peterbilt trucks, is preparing to lay off workers at a plant in Quebec for the second time in less than a year.
In a statement, officials with the Unifor labor union announced that Paccar has informed them that 175 people will lose their jobs at the company’s factory in Sainte-Thérèse, which manufactures light- and medium-duty trucks and has been in operation since 1999. The decision, union leaders said, comes about seven months after Paccar said it would lay off 250 workers at the plant as the market for its products had weakened.
Bellevue, Washington-based Paccar has not issued a statement regarding the layoffs in Sainte-Thérèse, its sole plant in Canada. The company’s leaders will report second-quarter results later this month.
Unifor representatives said this latest round of cuts is scheduled to become effective August 4 and said they hoped provincial government leaders and the company would “quickly reach an agreement aimed at limiting the impact on workers.”
Paccar ended 2024 with approximately 30,100 employees globally, up from 28,500 three years prior. But that number is now under pressure from a weak equipment market as fleets pull back on spending in the face of uncertainty about tariffs and their impact on customer activity. In late April, CEO Preston Feight told analysts his team expected the second quarter to be “relatively flat in deliveries.”
Several of Paccar’s peers have also been cutting jobs. In April, Volvo Group officials announced layoffs of approximately 800 people across their Volvo and Mack factory network, and Traton SE, the parent company of the International brand, eliminated a shift at its Mexican plant, resulting in the loss of 900 jobs.
Shares of Paccar (Ticker: PCAR) rose about 2% to $98.70 on July 8. Over the past six months, they have lost 9% of their value, a move that has trimmed the company’s market capitalization to about $52 billion.
About the Author
Geert De Lombaerde
Senior Editor
A native of Belgium, Geert De Lombaerde has more than two decades of experience in business journalism. Since 2021, he has written about markets and economic trends for Endeavor Business Media publications FleetOwner, Healthcare Innovation, IndustryWeek, Oil & Gas Journal, and T&D World.
With a degree in journalism from the University of Missouri, he began his reporting career at the Business Courier in Cincinnati. He later was managing editor and editor of the Nashville Business Journal. Most recently, he oversaw the online and print products of the Nashville Post and reported primarily on Middle Tennessee’s finance sector and many of its publicly traded companies.