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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowStant Corp., a 111-year-old manufacturing firm based in Connersville, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection yesterday, according to Bloomberg News.
Stant, the world’s top maker of automotive fuel, oil and radiator caps, was one of Indiana’s 20 largest public companies in the mid-1990s, with annual sales exceeding $600 million, before it was acquired by United Kingdom-based Tomkins PLC in 1997.
Miami-based private equity firm H.I.G. Capital LLC acquired Stant from Tomkins in June 2008 for an undisclosed amount. At the time, H.I.G. said Stant had more than 1,000 employees at six manufacturing plants in the United States, Mexico, the Czech Republic and China, annual sales of $179 million and assets of $95 million.
An official from Stant’s headquarters in Connersville could not be reached for comment this morning.
In late February, Stant laid off 26 workers in Connersville, leaving only 10 to 15 production workers at the plant, the Connersville News-Examiner Reporter said. The company employed as many as 800 production workers in Connersville in the 1960s.
The headquarters is still home to Stant’s machine-development, customer-service, purchasing and information-technology operations.
In the bankruptcy filing, Stant said it has between $50 million and $100 million in assets and $50 million and $100 million in debt. Struggling automakers General Motors Corp. and Chrysler LLC have been among Stant’s biggest customers.
Stant got its start in 1898 as a family-owned engine-repair shop and began manufacturing auto parts after World War I. The company is credited with inventing the locking gas cap in 1932 in response to gasoline theft during the Great Depression.
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