Laid off from Penske Logistics.

What Penske Logistics layoffs have meant for employees

When a Penske site's customer changes course, two questions come up, whether your Penske job survives and whether the work itself carries on somewhere you could follow it. Shelbyville, Indiana shows how closely the people stay with the work. When Penske won the contract to run Kroger's refrigerated distribution center there in 2013, it said it hired all 816 existing workers, Teamsters included, Transport Topics reported. In 2022 the handover ran the other way, and Penske's letter to Indiana steered the people it was laying off toward applying with Kroger. When RNDC moved to bring its Washington and Oregon work in-house in 2024, a Penske spokesperson said the switch had been communicated to workers well in advance of the state filings, according to Sourcing Journal. If the work at your site is moving to the customer or to another contractor, it's worth getting an application in with the incoming employer early. If you went to work for Kroger or RNDC after one of those handovers, their own layoff records are on Kroger's page and RNDC's page.

The 2009 Indianapolis shutdown shows how severance got settled when Penske lost that customer. Employers and unions have to bargain in good faith over a closing's effects, though not over whether to leave the business, the Seventh Circuit wrote in 2012. The union contract hadn't promised any severance for that event, and the package came out of the effects bargaining. The same opinion describes a clause in Penske's contract with the Star under which the newspaper would cover severance costs if Penske agreed to provide them. Former employees argued Penske should have used that clause to pay more and that the union should have bargained harder, and the court sent both claims to be dismissed for lack of federal jurisdiction, writing that "Section 301 provides enforcement of deals that were struck, rather than damages for deals never made." Those terms belonged to that one shutdown. If a union represents you at a site whose customer is leaving, it's worth following whether effects bargaining is under way, since that's where the 2009 terms came from.

Staying with Penske itself is a separate question. Penske's 2022 Indiana letter said it had no job bumping system, so laid-off employees couldn't displace more junior ones, and no other Teamsters Local 135 contract that would give them bumping rights. The 2024 Washington and Oregon notices gave no bumping rights either, Sourcing Journal reported. Openings elsewhere in the company are a different matter, and the company is a large one. Penske Logistics is part of Penske Transportation Solutions, a 2021 Penske release in Fleet Maintenance said, and Penske Automotive Group's 10-K for fiscal 2025 counts about 520 locations in that brand's international logistics business, while federal motor carrier records put Penske Logistics' drivers at nearly 8,800 in early 2024, per Sourcing Journal. Penske said in 2019 that it was looking for jobs at other company locations for the Fort Wayne drivers it was laying off, as FreightWaves reported, and the 2009 bargaining gave Indianapolis workers preference if they applied at other Penske companies. If you'd like to stay with Penske, it's worth letting local management know early, since the 2019 search for openings was the company's own.

For the Aurora, Naperville and Kinloch sites behind Penske's 2025 filings in our tracker, the rules for claiming benefits are at Illinois unemployment benefits and Missouri unemployment benefits.

A sourced history of Penske Logistics layoffs

• April 2025, Schnucks contract loss in Kinloch, Missouri

  Penske lost Schnucks' warehousing contract, and its notice listed 337 Kinloch workers for permanent layoff as the operation was due to pass to BGDC Distribution July 15; Penske said there'd be chances to transition there, per FreightWaves.

• September 2024, temporary layoffs during GM's Fairfax retooling

  Penske's letter to Kansas covered 70 employees in temporary layoffs tied to General Motors retooling its Fairfax plant and expected them to last six months, KCTV5 reported; our tracker dates the filing September 16, 2024.

• January 2024, RNDC moves to insource Washington and Oregon work

  RNDC moved to insource the warehousing and trucking Penske did for it; Penske's notices covered 125 Washington and 78 Oregon employees, who could apply to RNDC, Sourcing Journal reported, and Oregon's WARN list dates its notice January 31, 2024.

• July 2022, Kroger moves to take over Shelbyville warehouse

  Kroger told Penske it would insource the Shelbyville warehouse and take over September 11. Penske's letter counted about 517 employees, many in Teamsters Local 135, and said those on its attached list would be permanently laid off, with chances to work for Kroger.

• May 2019, Fort Wayne terminal closing after contract ends

  Citing a local trucking contract termination, Penske told Indiana it would close its Fort Wayne terminal in July and lay off 80 drivers; a spokesman told FreightWaves it was working to identify jobs for them elsewhere in Penske.

• May 2009, Indianapolis Star contract lost in a rebid

  The Indianapolis Star rebid the transportation work Penske had done since 1999 and Penske lost, an appeals court ruling recounts, so it told the union it would cease operations May 19, 2009; bargaining produced a week's severance and recall rights.

What to do if you're laid off from Penske Logistics

• File for unemployment in the state where you worked. Benefits run from your filing date, and severance usually doesn't block you. Penske Logistics's biggest hubs: Illinois, Missouri, Texas, Indiana. 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 Penske Logistics's hub states run: Illinois, Missouri, Texas, Indiana, 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.