Beverage can manufacturer Ball Corp to close Phoenix plant

PHOENIX – Metal-container manufacturer Ball Corp. said it is shutting down its aluminum can facility in Phoenix, citing rising costs and decreasing demand.

The Phoenix Business Journal reported Monday that about 120 workers at the site near 51st Avenue and Van Buren Street would be affected.

“In response to the deceleration in customer demand late in the second quarter, the construction of a new beverage can manufacturing facility in north Las Vegas, Nevada, has been delayed, and certain actions across the existing North American manufacturing footprint, including ceasing production at our Phoenix, Arizona, and St. Paul, Minnesota, facilities, have been announced to address localized supply/demand imbalances,” Ball said in a news release of its second-quarter 2022 performance.

One site will close before the end of the year and the other early next year, according to the earnings report.

“It’s very raw, very sensitive right now for a number of our employees,” CEO Daniel Fisher said during an investors call on Aug. 4.

“These are landlocked facilities. They are both really old facilities.”

Colorado-based Ball has two more sites in the Valley, Goodyear and Waddell, neither of which were mentioned in the call or news release.

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