Published: May 26, 2006 11:20 pm         

Herr’s Pacific lays off workers

Employees: Troubles started last fall

DANVILLE — Susan Skoog was only a week or two away from finishing a catalog for E.Z. Gregory when she learned the company was closing and she was being laid off.

Skoog, who had been a graphic artist for 10 years at Herr’s Pacific, lost her job May 19, as did the rest of the advertising department.

“I was working on a catalog for them, and my boss told me there’s no more E.Z. Gregory,” she said.

Last spring, IKG Partners LLC of Lincolnshire, the parent company of Herr’s Pacific at 70 Eastgate Drive, moved E.Z. Gregory to Danville.

IKG Partners LLC purchased the Madison, Wis.-based wholesaler that sold general merchandise, toys and pet supplies to drugstores in 2002.

At the time, IKG Partners said it decided to relocate E.Z. Gregory to Danville because of its eager work force and the local and state incentives it received.

The expansion added 35 new jobs and occupied the former Esco building, a 90,000-square-foot distribution center at 122 Eastgate Drive that had been vacant for a few years.

But a year later, E.Z. Gregory’s Web site no longer exists, some of E.Z. Gregory’s and Herr’s Pacific merchandise has been liquidated, and about 40 employees have been laid off.

Skoog said she wasn’t surprised when she was laid off last week. Her hours, as well as those of many others, had been cut to 36 and then to 32 hours a week.

“I was expecting it in a way because so many others had been laid off,” she said. “Several were let go from other departments that day, too.”

Some employees who lost their jobs had worked at Herr’s Pacific for more than 20 years.

“A lot of people depended on those salaries. It’s been a livelihood for many,” Skoog said. “It’s a very sad thing to have happen.”

IKG Partners LLC, which consists of Bob Scott and his two brothers-in-law, Michael and Steven Greenberg, acquired Herr’s in 2001.

Shortly after that, IKG Partners LLC acquired Pacific Creatives in Orange, Calif., an art supply/craft wholesaler, and merged the two companies in Danville.

Michael Greenberg and Scott did not return phone messages left for them in Lincolnshire.

A receptionist at Herr’s Pacific said Wednesday that the owners were not available for comment and that the company had no comment at this time.

Deb Thompson of Catlin, who worked at Herr’s Pacific for six years, was one of the first workers to be laid off April 28.

She expected her hours to be cut, but instead she lost her job.

“I figured the doors would close first before I lost my job,” she said.

Thompson and other laid-off workers started noticing trouble at the craft and art supply distributor last fall when new merchandise wasn’t coming into the Danville warehouse.

“Herr’s started having problems first,” she said. “E.Z. Gregory, being new, went down quicker.”

At the end of March, IKG Partners decided to discontinue its health and beauty products line, which was E.Z. Gregory’s primary merchandise.

“They liquidated some of the Herr’s and E.Z. Gregory’s merchandise when WR Crafts in Loves Park went out of business,” Thompson said.

“We were told they were liquidating old merchandise to get in new merchandise.”

Instead, E.Z. Gregory’s inventory was allowed to run out, according to laid-off workers.

Thompson, who cares for her children and a grandchild born the day after she was laid off, has had a difficult time finding a new job.

“Unfortunately, I only have a high school diploma,” she said. “I put in applications three to four times a week.

“It’s just hard finding a job right now.”