Now that Quaker Oats has decided to permanently close its plant in Danville, initial discussions have begun on the future of the building. Danville Mayor Rickey Williams Jr. discussed those efforts during an interview with Neuhoff Media’s Bill Pickett….
{AUDIO: “We have reached out to a couple of kind-of head-hunters of sorts that can help find people who use such facilities. We also have been working very closely with Governor Pritzker and the DCEO, Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity – as well as Senator Duckworth’s office – on the possibility of re-use of that site.”}
Over 12-hundred people turned out Wednesday for a career expo and job fair at the David S. Palmer Arena. Some of those who took advantage of the jobs fair are Quaker Oats employees who are affected by the company’s decision to close the Danville plant.
It was in 1968 that Quaker Oats announced it planned to build a plant in Danville that would initially employ 50 people. By 1973 the Quaker workforce at the East Voorhees plant had grown to 375. In 1982 the company said it would add a more than 30-thousand square foot addition in order to manufacture Quaker’s Chewy Granola Bars in Danville. The announcement brought with it an additional 120 jobs. The company continued to invest money in Danville by adding a more than $10-million dollar ready-to-eat cereal assembly line in 1998 and another $40-million dollar expansion in 2000.
The company says there were 510 people working at the plant when this month’s announcement was made that the Danville facility would be permanently closed.
