Jobs Wither in Drought of Recession : Shutdown: DataCard Corp. blames California costs and competition for closing Buena Park plant and laying off 125 people.

Citing California’s costly business environment as well as competitive factors, one of the world’s largest makers of plastic cards closed its Orange County plant Monday in a sudden and unannounced move and laid off the facility’s 125 workers.

DataCard Corp., based in Minneapolis, said that it would consolidate the operations of its Buena Park plant at its factory in Montgomeryville, Pa.

For security reasons, the local plant was closed immediately, said James D. Landes, president and general manager of the company’s Plastic Card Services division.

“We manufacture credit cards, which is like printing currency,” he said. “So we decided that all manufacturing operations would have to cease, without advance notice, to protect our customers.”

A handful of employees who work in the records department will stay on for a few weeks, Landes said. All employees will receive 60 days of severance pay and job placement counseling, he said.

DataCard makes identification cards, cards for automated teller machines and credit cards for dozens of major banks, retailers and oil companies. Its list of clients includes American Express, Bank of America and Mobil Corp.

Landes said that increased competition in the plastic card manufacturing industry, resulting in greater supply than demand, required DataCard to cut overhead.

“Aggravating the situation were some of the more costly expenses of running a business in California, be they air quality standards or the general cost of living,” he said.

DataCard has seven factories in the United States, including the Buena Park facility. It also has five plants overseas.

The 25-year-old company opened its Buena Park branch in 1981 after buying two buildings totaling 37,000 square feet on Orangethorpe Avenue near Beach Boulevard. Landes said DataCard will sell the buildings.

“Telling employees about the plant closure was a very, very tough thing to do,” said Landes, who came to Buena Park from Minneapolis to make the announcement. “It affects people’s lives and families. They have done an excellent job for us, and we are sad to see them leave our corporation.”