AGCO corporation’s decision to close its DeKalb manufacturing plant could affect more than just AGCO’s DeKalb County employees.

Encoat Services plant manager Dan Ramirez said nearly 100 percent of the company’s production comes from AGCO. Encoat paints parts of the Challenger track tractors manufactured at the AGCO facility. Ramirez said he was not concerned about AGCO’s closure.

“We’ve been looking for additional products for a while,” Ramirez said.

Encoat painted Caterpillar products before AGCO purchased the DeKalb manufacturing plant from Caterpillar, and Ramirez said the company was looking for more business from Caterpillar.

“Encoat is not closing the door, and we have no projected layoffs,” he said.

AGCO announced March 3 that it would be closing its DeKalb plant in May, and would be transferring the production of the Challenger tractors to another facility. The DeKalb AGCO plant averaged 20 percent of capacity in producing the tractors since it took over operations at the plant in December 2001. The plant employs 186.

In 2001, DeKalb, Sycamore and the state of Illinois spent $480,000 to build an access road to the facility, DeKalb County engineer Bill Lawrence said. The road was to be used for heavy trucks and equipment, but because of the low production of the plant, that road never was used.

Lawrence added the road was planned to eventually connect to Oakwood Avenue, even though the access road to the manufacturing plant was pushed through legislation early to give access for heavy equipment to the plant. Still, DeKalb County Economic Development Commission Executive Director Roger Hopkins said expenditure is likely to factor in when the county looks for new manufacturing companies to purchase the operation.

“AGCO representatives said the plant was one of the most modern facilities in their production line, and the staff was really good from a management standpoint,” Hopkins said. “That bodes well for the future of the plant.”

Hopkins added the decision was purely financial – the company just wasn’t selling enough heavy equipment.

AGCO’s Vice President of Corporate Relations Molly Dye said the company would examine a total of 30 positions for relocation.

Hopkins said after his dealings with the company, most of the positions AGCO is examining for relocation are associated with the tractor engineering group employed at the facility.

The county development commission is looking for potential buyers for the plant, focusing on companies that could use the plant’s modern facilities to a higher capacity than either AGCO or Caterpillar.

“We’re looking out for another company in heavy manufacturing, maybe an automotive or auto supply company,” Hopkins said.

The loss of the plant’s employees and production definitely will hurt the area, but Hopkins said the development commission is searching hard to fill the gap that will be left come May.