Ferry-Morse sold, closes

Ferry-Morse sold, closes

By Mike Marturello mikem@kpcnews.net

Thursday, May 24, 2012, 1:00am

FREMONT — State officials were notified Friday that Ferry-Morse Seed Co. was bought out and would be closing plants across the country, including one in Fremont that at one time employed up to 50 people.

In a required notice to state and local officials, it was announced that Ferry-Morse, Fulton, Ky., had been sold to Seed Holdings.

In Fremont, officials at the local plant were notifed on Friday and the facility was cleaned out that day, said Chris Snyder, town manager. Snyder had yet to receive the required notice as of Wednesday.

“It’s too bad,” Snyder said.

Ferry-Morse Seed moved into an existing facility in Fremont in fall 2010. The company moved into the former Indiana Wire building, a 120,000-square-foot facility.

When it came to Indiana, Ferry Morse’s committed investment to the state was $1.8 million, said Phil Johnson of the Indiana Economic Development Corp.

The IEDC offered Ferry-Morse Seed Company up to $100,000 in performance-based tax credits based on the company’s job creation plans.

The company operated a distribution center type of operation in Fremont.

The plant closure letter said Ferry-Morse would layoff about half of its workers on Friday and the other 200 employees by the end of the year. It was expected that the layoffs would be permanent. About half of the company’s employees were offered positions with Seed Holdings, but that didn’t appear to be the case with the Fremont facility.

Ferry-Morse had been in operation since 1856. It was founded in Detroit before eventually moving its headquarters to Kentucky.