Layoffs in Tennessee.

One caveat before the numbers. Our Tennessee archive runs from 2012 to 2026 but is missing the year 2024, which our source feed never supplied. Counts and comparisons here describe the years we actually hold, so treat any multi-year pattern with that hole in mind.

Where Tennessee layoffs have been concentrated

The largest recent filing came from Maury County, where the GM Ultium Cells battery plant noticed 710 jobs, an electric-vehicle facility cutting in the state that bet heavily on becoming the industry's southern home. Tennessee courted that investment hard, which makes a filing of this size early news rather than routine news.

Memphis supplies the second thread, and it is the one that defines the state's working economy. FedEx Supply Chain noticed 611 jobs in Shelby County and Nike Retail Services 583 more in the same county, two pieces of the logistics machine built around the world's busiest cargo airport. When distribution reorganizes nationally, Shelby County feels it first.

The rest is manufacturing spread across small counties, First Brands with 333 in Lincoln County as its bankruptcy worked south, Carlex with 325 in Monroe, Pilgrim's Pride with 315 in Hamilton. One note on reading this page, our Tennessee archive is missing 2024, so the coverage caveat above applies to any multi-year comparison.

Tennessee's own law covers only the employers federal WARN misses

Tennessee is counted among the states with their own plant-closing law, and the statute is worth reading closely before relying on it. The act defines a covered employer as one with at least 50 but not more than 99 full-time employees at a Tennessee workplace. That upper limit is the whole design. Federal WARN starts at 100, so the state law exists to cover the band underneath it rather than to add anything above.

What it requires is narrow. A reduction in operations means a closure, modernization or relocation of more than 50 miles that cuts 50 or more jobs in any three-month period, which at a company of 50 to 99 people is close to shutting down. When that happens, the employer notifies affected employees and then telephones the commissioner of labor and workforce development. The timing is the part worth being careful about, because published summaries routinely attach 60 days to this act. The statute names no number of days, and the state's own technical assistance guide describes the act as requiring covered employers to notify the dislocated worker unit at the time the employer notifies its employees. That is contemporaneous notification, not advance warning. The same guide discusses 60 days repeatedly, but in the passages describing the federal act, and its coverage section blends the two laws together in a way that is easy to misread. If you have seen 60 days quoted for Tennessee, that is where it comes from.

Enforcement points the same way. The commissioner's duty under the statute is to operate a toll-free line for receiving and encouraging employer compliance, the act's four sections contain no penalty provision and no right for a worker to sue, and the state's guide notes that the department has no legal, administrative or enforcement responsibility under WARN either. Above that band, from 100 staff upward, the meaningful protection is federal WARN, which does require 60 days in advance and does let workers sue. Most Tennessee workers reading this page will be in that group, so the 60 days you have heard about probably is yours, from the federal act rather than the state one.

What happens after a WARN notice is filed in Tennessee

Filings reach the state's workforce agency and appear on its WARN page, which sets the American Job Center network in motion. For plant-scale events in small counties, that center is frequently the only organized help within driving distance.

Because the state act carries no remedy, the practical legal question in Tennessee is entirely a federal one. Count the employer's total workforce rather than your site alone. Where that number clears 100 and the warning fell short, federal back pay becomes recoverable, which is worth an employment lawyer's hour.

Start a claim on our Tennessee benefits page within days, and Memphis logistics workers in particular should ask the job center which carriers and contractors are hiring, since the same warehouse skills move between operators continuously in that market.

Use what Tennessee owes you

• Work out your employer's total headcount first, because it decides which law you are under, the state act from 50 to 99 and federal WARN from 100 up, and only the federal one carries a remedy.
• If your employer has 100 or more people, the 60 days comes from federal law and is enforceable. If it has 50 to 99, expect notification at the time rather than in advance, since the state act sets no deadline of its own.
• Memphis-area logistics workers, the same skills move between carriers and third-party operators constantly, so ask the job center for currently hiring contractors before widening the search.
• Battery and EV plant workers, cuts at a new facility usually reflect demand timing rather than obsolete skills, which is worth saying plainly in interviews.
• Get the Tennessee claim open through our state page before the first full week passes, whatever severance conversation is still running.

The biggest layoffs in Tennessee's record

Our Tennessee record opens in 2012 and its heaviest year is 2020 with 264 notices, but the second heaviest is 2012 itself at 160, the tail of the manufacturing contraction that reshaped the state's small towns after the financial crisis.

The years since have run lighter and lumpier, which fits a state whose largest employers are distribution centers and plants rather than office towers. Cuts arrive as whole facilities rather than as percentage trims.

With 2024 absent from our archive, treat any statement about the recent trajectory as provisional. The individual events on this page are solid; the shape of the curve through them is not yet complete.

Common questions