Ford Motors announced Thursday that it is adding 1,200 workers and a second shift to its Missouri plant that manufactures the company's new Transit vans.
Ford Motors, one of the largest car making companies, is opening new job opportunities at its Missouri manufacturing plant owing to an increased demand for its Transit vans. The car maker announced Thursday that it will add 1,200 workers and an extra shift at the plant in the Kansas City suburb of Claycomo, Missouri, starting November.
The new hires will bring the total number of hour-based workers to over 6,000, including the 2,800 additions in 2012 and 2013 at the Kansas City Assembly Plant. The 4.7-million-square-foot facility is also the base for manufacturing Ford's F-150 trucks, which are being built in three round-the-clock shifts. Once the new shift kicks in late November, the number of vehicles built at the Claycomo facility will be more than any other Ford facility in the world, pushing the annual limit to 500,000 vehicles, according to Business Insider.
"The job growth we have created in U.S. manufacturing is a testament to our strong partnership with the UAW, the union's competitiveness, and the growing demand for Ford's portfolio of cars, utilities and trucks," Joe Hinrichs, Ford president of The Americas, said in a press statement published by Business Wire. "Adding a second shift to Kansas City Assembly Plant adds more jobs to this community, and it also helps deliver more Transit vehicles to more customers throughout North America."
In 2011, the car maker invested $1.1 billion in the expansion of its Kansas City facility to support Transit production and meet the increasing demand for F-150 trucks.
Ford's all-new Transit van replaces the E-Series van, which was the best-selling commercial van in the United States for 34 years. The new van comes equipped with a standard 3.7-liter V6 engine and gives 19 percent better gas mileage than the E-Series model. Transit offers various configurations such as three body lengths, two wheelbases, three roof heights, and van, wagon and chassis cab. Ford signed its first major order for more than 800 Transit vans with Missouri's cable company, Charter Communications, Detroit News reported.
The car maker expects the demand for the Transit vans to explode although the initial response has been slow. The company sold nearly 1,100 Transits in August and a total of 2,085 vans since the launch in June.
