Laid off from Hyster-Yale.

What Hyster-Yale layoffs have meant for employees

If you're on Hyster-Yale's Danville notice, the state's file on it kept changing after March. The company's Danville release called the move a phased transition, and Illinois's May 2026 WARN report and July 2026 WARN report show what that looked like on paper, with supplements adding workers in batches, each batch with its own layoff date, and 19 workers moved to a later date in July. So a date on the notice wasn't fixed for everyone on it. If your date matters for something outside work, like a lease or a new job's start date, it's worth keeping every notice and letter you get, because a later notice can change what an earlier one said.

Danville has been through a closing like this before. In 2001 NACCO Industries' materials handling group, described as its Hyster and Yale lift truck maker in a 2002 NACCO release, shut its Danville production plant, Forkliftaction reported, and the parts center, which Hyster-Yale said had been running for more than 50 years, stayed open. The company said the Danville center no longer fit the scale and complexity its needs required, and that the work itself would go to a larger site in Avon, Indiana, that would let it consolidate its outsourced shipping and packaging operations and serve as a showroom for customers, with demonstrations and training. The company told WCIA it had offered many Danville employees the chance to go, and said in December 2025 that it couldn't yet share how many would transfer. If you were offered a place in Avon, the pay, hours and any moving help there are all fair to weigh against staying in the Danville area.

In Greenville, Hyster-Yale wouldn't tell WITN how many people its 2024 shift cut affected, and the count WITN reported came from North Carolina's Commerce Department. For the 2025 worldwide cut, the Pitt County figure in WITN’s 2025 story came from one employee, and the company's figure, in its November 2025 release, was worldwide. If you're looking for the paperwork behind the 2024 cut, our WARN tracker has a matching North Carolina notice, filed under Hyster-Yale Materials Handling and dated November 14, 2024.

Hyster-Yale's own account of the 2025 cut was about costs and orders. That release said the plan would lower its break-even point to fit low industry volumes, particularly in the industrial segment, and help address a mismatch between recent shipping and booking rates. It called the actions additive to restructuring it had already announced and expected roughly $40 million to $45 million in yearly savings from them. The jobs came from manufacturing and staff functions worldwide, so this cut took in staff work as well as the plants, where the 2024 Greenville cut had fallen on a production shift. The company also expected better profits once volumes recovered, likely in mid-2026, as it put it that November.

Greenville was named as a receiving plant in an earlier consolidation of the Hyster and Yale business. When NACCO announced the Lenoir phase-out in 2002, that release said the mast and cylinder work would go to NACCO's plants in Greenville, Berea and Sulligent, and credited earlier programs with keeping lift truck production capacity substantially unchanged in fewer facilities. In 2024, Hyster-Yale's Greenville plant lost a shift. Both moves were set out in phases, Lenoir's over 12 to 15 months under NACCO and Danville's through a transition Hyster-Yale set for completion by fall 2026. If you're weighing a transfer within Hyster-Yale, Avon included, it's worth knowing that Greenville, named to gain work in that 2002 consolidation, later saw jobs cut.

A sourced history of Hyster-Yale layoffs

• March 2026, Danville parts center closing notice

  The closing notice Illinois received March 31 covered 20 workers from June 1, with relocation as the cause, its March 2026 report shows. Supplements in the May 2026 report and July 2026 report added 70 for July and September dates, making 90.

• December 2025, Danville parts center move to Indiana

  The parts work would move to a site in Avon, Indiana, pending approvals there, and Danville's center would close at the end of 2026, Hyster-Yale's Danville release said. A spokesperson told WCIA 220 people worked there, many offered the move.

• November 2025, worldwide cut of about 575 employees

  About 575 employees across global manufacturing and staff functions would go, at an expected one-time pre-tax charge of about $21 million, Hyster-Yale said in a November 19 release. One employee told WITN over 100 of the cuts were in Pitt County, North Carolina.

• November 2024, Greenville plant cut to one shift

  North Carolina's Commerce Department said 97 employees would go at the Greenville plant, which Hyster-Yale was taking from two shifts to one, with layoffs from January 23 expected to be permanent, WITN reported. Almost half were assemblers.

• December 2002, Lenoir plant phase-out under NACCO

  NACCO Materials Handling Group, NACCO Industries' Hyster and Yale maker, would phase out its Lenoir, North Carolina component plant of about 310 people and move the work to Sulligent, Alabama, Berea, Kentucky and Greenville, NACCO said in a December 2002 release.

• 2001, Danville production plant closing under NACCO

  NACCO Industries' lift truck unit, NACCO Materials Handling Group, which a 2002 NACCO release calls its Hyster and Yale maker, closed its Danville production plant and laid off 680 workers, Forkliftaction reported.

What to do if you're laid off from Hyster-Yale

• File for unemployment in the state where you worked. Benefits run from your filing date, and severance usually doesn't block you. Hyster-Yale's biggest hubs: Illinois, North Carolina. Somewhere else? Every state is here.
• Apply for financial and hardship assistance. Unemployment supplements income, but food benefits, health coverage and utility help are often available as well. Here's some of what Hyster-Yale's hub states run: Illinois, North Carolina, and every other state is here.
• Mind the health insurance window. Losing coverage opens a 60-day special enrollment period, and an ACA plan usually beats unsubsidized COBRA. Compare your options before the employer coverage lapses, and read how the COBRA clocks run if you are weighing it seriously.
• Get your real runway number. Severance plus savings divided by reality. The calculator takes five minutes.
• Know which clocks are already running. Severance review windows, COBRA election, visa grace periods, and 401(k) rollovers all run on federal deadlines that started at termination. All five deadlines are here.