Yellow Trucking, headquartered in Overland Park, shuts down operations

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (KCTV) - Thousands of workers across Kansas City and the country are looking for another job.

is headquartered in Overland Park.

On Sunday, they shut down operations, leaving their workers in the metro without a paycheck.

“I just can’t believe it,” said former Yellow Corporation employee Ed Georgie. “I just can’t really believe it.”

After spending 44 years working for Yellow, Georgie is now out of a job.

“I lose 12% of my retirement benefit for a penalty for not being 65 years of age,” Georgie added.

The company employed 30,000 workers across the country. Now, the Teamsters Union says they’re all out of a job.

“I talked to a guy the other day, and he was around 34 years in,” said former Yellow Corporation employee Ronald Pyles. “He was like 56 years old. I really feel bad for him because he’s not old enough to retire. It’s just a bad situation.”

Yellow’s closing comes just three years after they took a federal pandemic loan.

“The federal government gave them $700 million,” Georgie recalled. “In three years, how do you lose $700 million? I can’t get my mind around that.”

KCTV5′s Josh Jackson reached out to Yellow for their side of the story. The company did not want to talk.

Teamsters Union President Sean M. O’Brien said: “Today’s news is unfortunate but not surprising. Yellow has historically proven that it could not manage itself despite billions of dollars in worker concessions and hundreds of millions in bailout funding from the federal government.”

“I kind of saw it coming, but I was optimistic,” Pyles said. “I didn’t think it would go this far.”

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