WestRock closing big paper plant in St. Paul, laying off 189 workers

WestRock is closing its massive paper processing plant on Wabash Avenue in St. Paul and laying off the 189 workers there.

The company in a state filing said the recycling plant closure will be in June and is considered permanent.

It comes after years of staff shuffling and premature rumors of demise for the factory between Interstate 94 and University Avenue.

Workers from truck drivers and electricians to machine operators will lose their jobs, according to the notice filed Wednesday with the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development.

Many of the workers belong to the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 110; the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 70; and the United Steelworkers of America Local 264, the filing said.

The company was unavailable for comment. It did not spell out in its filings the reasons for the shutdown.

“This is a big deal for St. Paul,” said Wayne Gjerde, the state’s recently retired product recycling coordinator at the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency.

The WestRock factory was a mainstay and dealt for decades with the state and with scores of Minnesota corporations to turn waste into usable new products, he said.

As demand for paper mail and magazines have declined, other paper mills have closed, including in northern Minnesota.

The plant, formerly called RockTenn, at various times made cardboard used to box General Mills cereal.

In 2020, WestRock had about $20 million in annual revenue generated from pulp, paperboard or corrugated paper factories in Minneapolis, St. Paul, Fridley and Fargo. It closed the Fridley plant in 2023.

WestRock was hurt by Electrolux’s refrigeration plant closure in St. Cloud in 2019, as WestRock used to make all its freezer boxes.