183-year-old giant tool company closes factory, lays off dozens

Underperforming store locations have been a major problem for various retail sectors, such as supermarkets, apparel shops, and drugstore chains, forcing retailers to close shops to eliminate a drain on liquidity.

Restaurants have also closed struggling locations to cut their losses, and now manufacturers are also closing underperforming facilities as well.

Giant tool company Stanley Black & Decker Inc. plans to close its underperforming Hampstead, Md., factory and lay off 55 workers, according to a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act notice filed with the Maryland Department of Labor on Aug. 19.

Layoffs at the factory are set to begin on Oct. 23, 2026, and continue through the facility's closing by March 26, 2027, according to the WARN notice.

"Over the past few years, we have seen a steady decline in volume in the materials produced at our Hampstead, Maryland, manufacturing facility," Stanley Black & Decker spokesperson Debora Raymond told the Baltimore Sun .

"Due to this we are announcing our intent to close the site. We are focused on providing a smooth transition to impacted employees, including options for employment at other Stanley Black & Decker U.S. facilities and operations for salaried employees, in addition to severance, and job placement support services for both salaried and hourly employees," Raymond said.

The roots of Stanley Black & Decker trace back to 1843 when Frederick T. Stanley co-founded Stanley Bolt Manufactory and later founded The Stanley Works in 1852.

Black & Decker was founded by S. Duncan Black and Alonzo G. Decker as a small machine shop in Baltimore in 1910, making machines for producing milk bottle caps and for candy dipping, according to the Black & Decker website.

Company patented a handheld electric drill

The company patented a handheld electric drill in 1917 and opened a large-scale manufacturing facility in Towson, Md., in 1929.

Stanley and Black & Decker completed their merger in 2010 to become Stanley Black & Decker. The company is the world's largest tool company with $15.13 billion in revenue in 2025, according to VerityRank .

Decades before the two tool companies merged, Black & Decker built the Hampstead factory in 1951 to manufacture power tools. The plant grew to 374 acres with a 30-acre parking lot for its 3,800 employees by 1969.

The company closed the Towson facility in 1965, but it remained Black & Decker's headquarters.

The Hampstead factory employed 2,000 workers in the 1970s, but in December 1985, the company closed its power tool manufacturing operations when efforts to modernize the plant failed. The factory became the East Coast's principal distribution center instead.