Laid off from Koppers.

What Koppers layoffs have meant for employees

Koppers' word for Florence was idle, while South Carolina's workforce agency put the plant on its list of new closures, as The State reported, citing the agency's latest report. Both labels describe the same plant, and the paper wrote that its whole staff was to be laid off. For the people on that list, the scope says more about their jobs than whichever word the plant goes by, since it left nobody at Florence out. South Carolina unemployment benefits has the state's weekly amounts and claim rules for anyone who worked there.

Vance went a different way in the same decision. The Pittsburgh Business Times described a consolidation into another plant close by, which gives Vance's work a destination. The report gave its workers none, and folding a plant into a neighbor moves its work while leaving the people who ran it a separate matter. If Koppers does offer you work at that other plant, the commute, the shift and the pay there are the things to set beside your Vance job before you answer. Alabama's benefit rules are under Alabama unemployment benefits for anyone whose Vance job ended.

At Stickney, Koppers wrote the union into the decision itself. By its May 8 release, ending production there was subject to whatever bargaining obligations Koppers had to the union representing certain employees, and the wind-down waited on discussions with that union. That made the closing something negotiated as well as announced. For represented workers, the company's plan was open to those talks rather than settled on the day Koppers published it. If you're in that bargaining unit, it may be worth keeping whatever the union reports about those talks together with whatever Koppers sends you, since the company tied its own timing to them. Anyone whose Stickney job ends can find Illinois benefit amounts and filing rules at Illinois unemployment benefits.

Koppers' statements about what happens to Stickney after production ends all point the same way. Ball's verdict on the first-quarter call, in MarketBeat's summary of it, was that "we just don't see a credible path to get there," and the release counted the savings at about $15 million to $20 million a year in adjusted EBITDA from 2027 on, with annual free cash flow better by $15 million to $25 million once the action was done. Nyborg had room to absorb the volume, the company said, as Chemical Processing reported, and Koppers had built up shipping and terminals to keep supplying pitch and creosote to North American customers. It was weighing other uses for the Stickney site. For anyone holding out for a restart, Koppers built its own plans for the site around production staying gone.

The May decision came after Stickney had already given up a product line, and Ball's own statement said the plant had kept struggling "despite significant restructuring efforts." A drop in Carbon Materials and Chemicals sales in late 2025 came mainly from discontinued phthalic anhydride production and lower carbon pitch prices, by Lesprom's summary, and Chemical Processing later placed that line at Stickney, which fits the release's talk of winding down the remaining production. In August the same report said Koppers was speeding up the closure. If you're still at Stickney and another job is in view, it's worth knowing that December 31 was the target the company set in May, with the move to Nyborg tentatively set for the fourth quarter, before Chemical Processing reported it was moving faster.

A sourced history of Koppers layoffs

• May 2026, decision to end Stickney, Illinois production

  Koppers made a conditional decision to end production at Stickney, affecting about 85 employees and pending union talks, its May 8 release said. It planned to wind down by December 31, 2026 and shift production to Nyborg, Denmark.

• February 2026, decision to idle Florence and Vance plants

  Koppers decided to idle production at its Florence, South Carolina and Vance, Alabama plants, Lesprom reported. About 75 layoffs were planned, the Pittsburgh Business Times reported, about 66 of them at Florence on April 21 under a South Carolina WARN notice.

What to do if you're laid off from Koppers

• File for unemployment in the state where you worked. Benefits run from your filing date, and severance usually doesn't block you. Koppers's biggest hubs: South Carolina, Illinois, Alabama. 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 Koppers's hub states run: South Carolina, Illinois, Alabama, 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.