Vertex Railcar Corp. officials announced Friday that the Wilmington rail car manufacturer is reducing a small portion of its workforce temporarily.

Don Croteau, CEO of Vertex Railcar, said Friday morning that most of those who were laid off were given letters stating a date when they can expect to return to their jobs. He did not share the exact number of workers laid off or how many people are currently employed at Vertex Railcar, citing competitive reasons.

The last time Vertex shared employment numbers publicly, officials said the company had about 221 employees after laying off 61 workers in May 2016.

The latest reduction is needed, Croteau said, in part because the company's 500,000-square-foot facility at 202 Raleigh St. in Wilmington must undergo "a major shuffling of the deck" in terms of physical changes to allow for the production of several larger, longer-term rail car orders.

"It's something we have to do, that all businesses have to do from time to time," he said of the temporary reduction. 

Croteau said laying people off was a difficult decision but it also means that he as a CEO and Vertex as a corporation "need to do things better in the future."

In November 2014, North Carolina's governor at the time, Pat McCrory, announced that Vertex would open a facility in Wilmington to make rail cars including tank cars, helping to replace some of the 70,000 obsolete tank cars required by new federal specifications and hire more than 1,300 workers. Since then, the price of oil, which the tank cars carry, per barrel has dropped by more than half from more than $100 to around $50.

Croteau said Friday that the Wilmington facility was created to produce 8,000 rail cars a year, which would allow for the employment of 1,000 to 1,300 people, but it remains to be seen whether the market will improve or allow for that level of hiring.

Wilmington developers who are also owners of an ethanol plant in Indiana said earlier this year that they have ordered 100 new tank cars from Vertex Railcar Corp., a transaction valued at about $11 million and for which production is expected to start next year, Croteau said.

In its news release about the layoffs Friday, Vertex officials said, "Our Generation Next tank car meets new DOT 117 government regulations and serves the industries of crude oil, chemical, and food grade transportation, among many others. VRC is also in the manufacturing of a variety of covered hopper cars."