Nissan to close parts warehouse network

NISSAN Australia will close its local parts warehouses next month at a cost of 58 jobs, as national logistics specialist CEVA takes over the management of the company's local spares distribution network.

From the start of August, the Japanese car-maker will out-source all distribution and warehousing functions to CEVA Logistics, following a review that revealed Nissan's parts infrastructure was uncompetitive.

In a statement, Nissan said that significant investments in areas such as distribution, IT infrastructure and property were required to address safety, technical and environmental standards, and the contracting of a logistics specialist was the most economical option.

Instead of committing the sizable sum of capital for the necessary process and efficiency improvements, Nissan has decided to hand over operations to the third-party specialist, which also handles car transportation for a number of other brands.

The nationwide transport company already has contracts with Mazda, Isuzu, Mercedes-Benz and Subaru to haul complete vehicles.

Nissan said that its Dandenong South casting plant in Victoria is unaffected by the changes, and the manufacturing facility will continue as normal “beyond 2020” as previously reported.

In the statement, Nissan confirmed the distribution change “does not affect Nissan’s Australian component manufacturing operation at Nissan Casting Australia,” it said. “This is separate to Nissan Australia’s parts warehousing and logistics operations.” Nissan says it is prepared to support the employees affected by the changes and all 58 staff have “been offered assistance relating to re-employment outside Nissan along with other related support services.” The company has not had to make any job cuts in the wake of the announcement that Holden, Ford and Toyota will cease local manufacturing by 2017.

Nissan last made redundancies in 2009 when about 20 per cent of the Dandenong head office white-collar staff were laid off during the global financial crisis.

Honda Australia has also previously made warehouse staff cuts, and in 2013 cut 24 jobs from the Tullamarine warehouse in Victoria when, it too, contracted CEVA to control its storage operations.