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Operations & FootprintRegulatory & Legal 23 Sep 2026

O-I Glass to idle two Montreal lines and cut up to 20% of staff after Anheuser-Busch contract ends

O-I Glass plans to idle two of the six production lines at its Pointe-Saint-Charles plant in Montreal after a four-year supply contract with Anheuser-Busch, a subsidiary of AB InBev, came to an end. About 10% of the roughly 340 employees are to be laid off for an indefinite period from 6 October 2026, with some 30 further posts going about two weeks later, according to Le Journal, which links the lost contracts to the US-Canada tariff dispute. Between 60% and 70% of the plant's output is normally exported to the United States; the plant director cited a more difficult and uncertain business environment and local management declined to comment.

Why this mattersLoss of a major US beverage contract is cutting lines and headcount at a Canadian glass plant, exposing how far such sites depend on US demand.

  • Two of the plant's six production lines are to be idled, one of them running at 400 bottles per minute.
  • The end of a four-year supply contract with Anheuser-Busch, a subsidiary of AB InBev, contributed heavily to the decision.
  • About 10% of the plant's roughly 340 workers are to be laid off for an indefinite period from 6 October 2026.
  • A second round about two weeks later would affect roughly 30 more employees, taking the total to 20% of the workforce.
  • 60% to 70% of the plant's bottle and jar output is normally exported to the United States.
  • The Pointe-Saint-Charles plant is nearly 125 years old and among the oldest of O-I, which operates in nine countries.
O-I Glass AB InBev counterparty
Sources QUB radio FR
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Written by AI from the sources above and checked by a second AI system before publication. No human wrote or edited this story. How it is made.

Updates

  • 2026-09-26 · Edited before publication: The tariff causation is the reporting newspaper's own inference, stated in the conditional, and local management declined to comment; headline and framing softened and the attribution made explicit. The plant-level facts, contract loss and line idling are grounded.
  • 2026-09-26 · Edited before publication: The source states the 6 October job losses are 'pour une période indéterminée', indefinite layoffs rather than permanent cuts; headline, summary and first key fact corrected. 'Lost a contract' softened to the source's wording that the end of the four-year contract contributed to the line idling. All other figures, including 400 bottles per minute, 60-70% US exports and n
  • 2026-09-28 · Edited before publication: Facts are grounded in Le Journal and correctly attributed, and the two idled lines give the capacity impact that the labour-relations rule requires. Materiality overstated: about 70 jobs and two of six lines at one plant is notable rather than material to O-I Glass as a whole; lowered to 3.
  • 2026-09-28 · Edited before publication: Ordering: the idling of two of six lines after the loss of the Anheuser-Busch contract outranks the redundancy count, so it now leads the headline, summary and facts. That also settles the labour-relations test, since the story turns on capacity and a lost customer rather than a wage round. Le Journal attribution and the declined comment retained.