Dec 15, 2008. /Lesprom.com/. Ainsworth Lumber Co. has extended the shutdown of its oriented strand board plants in Bemidji and Cook, Minnesota, into the foreseeable future, putting 280 people out of work, Minneapolis Star Tribune reported. Bruce Rose is Ainsworth vice president for corporate development says the lack of new housing starts as the cause for the indefinite closures. He says when it comes to residential building, the industry is in a depression. The Vancouver-based company ordered a temporary shutdown of the plants in the fall. Rose says demand for their plywood-like products have weakened even more since then. Rose says the Bemidji and Cook plants will be kept heated and secured and the equipment maintained with hopes of reopening when the economy improves. Ainsworth bought the Bemidji, Cook and Grand Rapids plants in 2004 for a combined price of $450 million. When it was operating at capacity, the Ainsworth Bemidji plant produced 350 million square feet of 3/8ths-inch OSB annually using 550,000 tons of logs.