Cirrus Announces Cutbacks, Furloughs

Just before the Thanksgiving long weekend, Cirrus Design told employees it was significantly reducing aircraft production for the rest of the year, and as a result of the "production pause," there would be furloughs. A local paper in Duluth, Minnesota, home of Cirrus headquarters, reported that 335 employees would get bad news over the holidays, with an additional 165 to be temporarily laid off at Cirrus's Grand Forks, North Dakota, plant. The good news is that employees are expected to return to work on January 5, and Cirrus will continue to pay for their insurance and other benefits in the meantime. The layoffs are confined to production line workers, and personnel in the sales, customer service, product assurance, engineering and development, and the Vision Jet research program are unaffected.