Paint plant to close; 37 jobs lost

Sherwin-Williams Co. will close its Columbia Paint and Coatings manufacturing facility in Spokane, eliminating 37 jobs. The paint-making plant on Haven Street opened 36 years ago.

No retail paint stores are closing, said company spokesman Mike Conway. Sherwin-Williams acquired Helena-based Columbia Paint in 2007.

The company operates 120 Sherwin-Williams stores and 42 Columbia Paint stores in six Northwest states, Conway said. That includes four Columbia and six Sherwin-Williams stores in the Spokane area.

The Spokane plant will close this summer because “the challenges in the economy have created reduced demand and created excess capacity,” Conway said Wednesday.

Employees learned of the closure Tuesday, he said. All will be able to apply for other jobs within the company’s system of stores and paint manufacturers, Conway added. Workers also will be offered severance packages, he said.

T-Mobile to split data center

Bellevue, Wash.-based cell phone carrier T-Mobile has begun plans to move some of its data center operations to a new facility in East Wenatchee.

The data center being built is owned and operated by the Sabey Corp., based in Tukwila, Wash.

T-Mobile will be the first tenant in the data center near Pangborn Airport in East Wenatchee. The data center will take up about 200,000 square feet, leaving 180,000 square feet for other tenants.

Sabey’s decision to build a data center in Central Washington is part of a trend, as large tech firms cite affordable electric power and minimal environmental hazards. Quincy, in Grant County, is now home to recently built data centers for Microsoft and Yahoo.

Sabey owns and operates office buildings and medical complexes in Seattle. Last year the Sabey Corp. bought 39 acres from the Port of Quincy for future data center projects.

Detroit

Sliver of hope amid sales drop

Sales of new cars and trucks in March continued to be dismal, but there was a silver lining in the 36.8 percent drop in sales compared with the same month a year ago: The typical seasonal increase in sales between February and March was the strongest it’s been in three years.

So while year-over-year sales were down 44.7 percent for GM, 40.8 percent for Ford and 39.3 percent for Chrysler, automakers saw positive signs.

Industrywide auto sales are usually about 20 percent higher in March than in February. But this year, industrywide auto sales increased 24.5 percent from February to March, according to Autodata Corp., of Woodcliff Lake, N.J.

Detroit Free Press