No more Hostess Twinkies for St. Louis! - Hostess Closing 3 Bakeries.

[Ponce]

They were getting to expensive anyway....from a dime up to .25 cents. Next they will read "Made in China" I hope.
==============================================


Hostess Closing 3 Bakeries Following Strike.

Hostess Brands Inc. is permanently closing three bakeries following a nationwide strike by its bakers union.

The maker of Twinkies, Ding Dongs and Wonder Bread said Monday that the strike has prevented it from producing and delivering products, and it is closing bakeries in Seattle, St. Louis and Cincinnati. The facilities employ 627 workers.

Hostess, based in Irving, Texas, operates 36 bakeries nationwide and has about 18,300 employees. It warned earlier this month that the strike, by about 30 percent of its workforce, could lead to bakery closures.

"We deeply regret this decision, but we have repeatedly explained that we will close facilities that are no longer able to produce and deliver products because of a work stoppage — and that we will close the entire company if widespread strikes cripple our business," Hostess Brands CEO Gregory F. Rayburn said.

Hostess said customers will not be affected by the closures.

A representative for the union could not be reached immediately for comment Monday.

Thousands of members of the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union went on strike Nov. 9 to protest cuts to wages and benefits under a new contract offer, which the union rejected in September. Union officials say the company stopped contributing to workers' pensions last year.

Hostess has argued that workers must make concessions as it tries to improve its financial position.

The privately-held food maker filed for Chapter 11 protection in January, its second trip through bankruptcy court in less than a decade. Hostess cited increasing pension and medical costs for employees as one of the drivers behind its latest filing.

The company, founded in 1930, is fighting battles beyond labor costs, however. Competition is increasing in the snack space and Americans are increasingly conscious about healthy eating.

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireSto...trike-17702034

[madfranks]

Instead of striking and forcing the closure of three bakeries, they should have worked harder to increase production and encourage all friends and family to support them by buying hostess products. If I were the CEO I would be considering a lawsuit against the union for crippling the business.

[osoab]

Was hostess bought up by private equity, pillaged, and then spun off on it's own again? That has been the playbook for a lot of nationally recognized companies.

[Silver Rocket Bitches!]

Entitlement mentality. Union workers deserve to work for 25 years then collect a pension for the next 40 years. That worked in the 50s. Not so much in the global economy where workers in China produce the same sugary starchy snacks for pennies.

[Rubberchicken]

More than you ever wanted to know- http://www.twinkiesproject.com/


T.W.I.N.K.I.E.S. stands for Tests With Inorganic Noxious Kakes In Extreme Situations.

T.W.I.N.K.I.E.S. is a series of experiments conducted during finals week, 1995, at Rice University. The tests were designed to determine the properties of that incredible food, the Twinkie.

[steel_ag]

twinkies for barter?

[Ponce]

Remember that the major of San Francisco got away with murder while under the influence of Twinkies.

[steel_ag]

Remember that the major of San Francisco got away with murder while under the influence of Twinkies.

lol ;) . For real?

[osoab]

http://www.zerohedge.com/sites/default/files/pictures/picture-5.jpg (http://www.zerohedge.com/users/tyler-durden)
Twinkies, Ding Dongs Maker Hostess Liquidates Following Failure To Resolve Labor Union Animosity (http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-11-16/twinkies-ding-dongs-maker-hostess-liquidates-following-failure-resolve-labor-union-a)

Hostess Brands, the company better known as the maker of Butternut, Ding Dongs, Dolly Madison, Drake's, Home Pride, Ho Hos, Hostess, Merita, Nature's Pride, and of course Wonder Bread and Twinkies, and which previously survived one multi-year Chapter 11 bankruptcy process, when it operated as Interstate Bakeries, has just made a splash at the NY Southern Bankruptcy court, for the last time, with a liquidation filing. The reason: insurmountable (and unfundable) difference in the firm's collective bargaining agreements and pension obligations, which resulted in a crippling strike that basically shut down the company. In other words, Twinkies may well survive the nuclear apocalypse, but there was one weakest link: the company making them, was unable to survive empowered labor unions who thought they had all the negotiating leverage... until they led their bankrupt employer right off liquidation cliff. Will attention now turn to that another broke government entity, the Pension Benefit Guarantee Corp (http://www.pbgc.gov/)(PBGC), which will have to step in to resuscitate some 18,000 pension plans which suddenly vaporized after labor unions took their "negotiating" freedom a step too far. Finally, those 18,500 new initial jobless claims next week? Sandy's fault.

[mamboni]

Legacy costs killed this company. 18,000 jobs are vaporized. So are their pensions. These folk will no doubt try to get a federal pension bailout via PBGC. This means more money printing by the FED which is about to run out of short term debt to sell for Operation Twist. FED balance sheet has been flat for months. 18,000 jobs lost means lost payroll tax revenues and 18,000 more unemployment checks going out. The federal deficit is going to explode in 2013. The FED is going to start massive unsterilized monetization soon or the US economy is going to implode; because Obamacare is going to tip hundreds of companies like Hostess into the exact same scenario. Millions of workers hoping for fixed benefit pensions are in a for nasty reality check. FUBAR America doesn't begin to describe the catastrophy that is coming.

[chad]

Legacy costs killed this company. 18,000 jobs are vaporized. So are their pensions. These folk will no doubt try to get a federal pension bailout via PBGC. This means more money printing by the FED which is about to run out of short term debt to sell for Operation Twist. FED balance sheet has been flat for months. 18,000 jobs lost means lost payroll tax revenues and 18,000 more unemployment checks going out. The federal deficit is going to explode in 2013. The FED is going to start massive unsterilized monetization soon or the US economy is going to implode; because Obamacare is going to tip hundreds of companies like Hostess into the exact same scenario. Millions of workers hoping for fixed benefit pensions are in a for nasty reality check. FUBAR America doesn't begin to describe the catastrophy that is coming.

new money is coming soon. i wonder what color it will be.

[Libertytree]

One has to Wonder..(pardon pun) just how friggin stupid these union people are. It doesn't take a nobel economist to figure out the economy is in a bad way and getting worse, businesses are struggling and the .gov is compounding matters w/ Ocare impending. So, what do they do? Vote themselves out of what is probably a damn good job...idiots.

[Dogman]

One has to Wonder..(pardon pun) just how friggin stupid these union people are. It doesn't take a nobel economist to figure out the economy is in a bad way and getting worse, businesses are struggling and the .gov is compounding matters w/ Ocare impending. So, what do they do? Vote themselves out of what is probably a damn good job...idiots.


++ What he said!

[Libertytree]

I sure hope this doesn't affect my favorite...Zingers!

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b6/Vanilla_zingers.JPG/800px-Vanilla_zingers.JPG (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b6/Vanilla_zingers.JPG)

[General of Darkness]

The parasite (union) killed its host or its hostess. Oh the irony.

[mamboni]

I sure hope this doesn't affect my favorite...Zingers!

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b6/Vanilla_zingers.JPG/800px-Vanilla_zingers.JPG (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b6/Vanilla_zingers.JPG)

Those things look so damn good; so they must be really really bad for you.

[Libertytree]

Zingers rock! Way better than Twinkies, IMO.

Twinkies changed their recipe somewhere along the line and weren't as good as they were when I 1st remember eating them as a kid. Not near as moist, different texture and taste and less creamy filling.

They're both probably death in a wrapper but if you indulge and include chocolate milk when consuming them the chocolate milk counter acts any health risks :)

[EE_]

Don't worry, your favorite snacks will be back with the new owners...just with new names.

Chinkies, White Devil cakes, Round Eyes (doughnuts), GungHos, Ching Dongs and Zingpows

Maybe they will come with fortunes?
http://www.offbeatearth.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/stupidity_small.jpg

[mamboni]

This Hostess liquidation story has all the elements of capital destruction: bloated underfunded legacy costs, too much corporate debt, unanticipated rise in cost of operations (raw materials) secondary to inflation (Fuck You Bernanke) and Hedge Fund involvement with staggering corporate greed. Hostess was a pinata and the vulture capitalists used a 40 oz metal bat on it. And the unions played right into their greedy hands and will likely get screwed. What a complete clusterfuck. This kind of corporate rape and pillage is going to play out all over America as companies are looted for their parts values and hundreds of thousands of workers get layed off. American Depression II here we come.

See the Zerohedge article here: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-11-16/hostess-liquidation-curious-cast-characters-twinkie-tumbles

and this:

http://news.yahoo.com/bctgm-members-initiate-national-strike-hostess-bra... (http://news.yahoo.com/bctgm-members-initiate-national-strike-hostess-brands-211700642.htm)

Hostess Brands is in bankruptcy for the second time in eight years. Since the first bankruptcy in 2004, BCTGM members across the country have taken dramatic wage and benefit concessions and watched as 21 Hostess plants were shut down and thousands of jobs lost. At the time of the first bankruptcy, Hostess workers were assured by management that money saved via concessions or plant closings would help make the company stronger, more vibrant, and more competitive.

Instead, helpless Hostess employees watched as money that was supposed to go towards capital investment, product development, plant improvement and new equipment went to executive bonuses and payouts to the hedge funds that own Hostess Brands. They watched as the company illegally withdrew from all Taft-Hartley pension plans, saving more than $50 million in the first five months. The BCTGM learned that the then Hostess CEO was to be awarded a 300% raise, and at least nine other top executives were to receive raises ranging between 35% and 80%.

Since the company ceased making contractually obligated payments to the Hostess workers' pensions in July 2011, it has pocketed approximately $160 million – money earned by and owed to its dedicated workforce.

Striking members know that the Wall Street investors currently in control of the company have no intention of building a world class wholesale bread and cake company. They will simply take the money from the workers' severe concessions and the sale of assets, pay themselves and then liquidate the company.

The company's business plan, when reviewed by a highly-respected financial analyst retained by the company, was determined to have little or no chance of succeeding in saving Hostess.

The current CEO, Greg Rayburn, was originally brought on as a consultant because of his expertise in corporate liquidations. He has absolutely no experience running a baking company and the Wall Street investors that own the company have absolutely no interest of rebuilding the baking business.

"Our members have fought hard for decades through the collective bargaining process to build a decent standard of living for themselves and their families. The deplorable actions taken by Hostess would take our members back to the workplace standards of the 1950's.

"Our members have now said NO to Hostess and the Wall Street investors in the only means available to them, the strike. The BCTGM International Union stands in full and uncompromising support of our striking members," concludes Hurt.
The BCTGM represents more than 80,000 workers in the baking, food processing, grain milling and tobacco industries in the United States and Canada.

[Neuro]

Don't worry, your favorite snacks will be back with the new owners...just with new names.

Chinkies, White Devil cakes, Round Eyes (doughnuts), GungHos, Ching Dongs and Zingpows

Maybe they will come with fortunes?
http://www.offbeatearth.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/stupidity_small.jpg
LOL! They'll bake them with cement instead of flour, so that they better can withstand transport, and a longer shelf life...

[JohnQPublic]

LOL! They'll bake them with cement instead of flour, so that they better can withstand transport, and a longer shelf life...

They can promote them as being "full of minerals".

[Sparky]

I sure hope this doesn't affect my favorite...Zingers!



Zingers are on the chopping block, manufactured by Hostess and their Dolly Madison subsidiary. In addition to Hostess Twinkies, Cupcakes and Fruit Pies, they also own the entire Drakes' line. I imagine someone will come in and buy most of their product line, since they have such name recognition. They also own a number of bread companies (Wonder Bread, Home Pride, Nissen, Nature's Pride, etc.) and a slew of other brands.

DRAKE'S
Ring Dings
Yodels
Funny Bones
Fruit Pies
Coffee Cake Junior
Devil Dogs
Yankee Doodles
Sunny Doodles
Creme Cups

[willie pete]

The parasite (union) killed its host or its hostess. Oh the irony.

Neh......barack-O-clause will come through for 'em....

[joboo]

http://cdn-www.i-am-bored.com/media/hostess-brands-debt-graph.png

[zap]

I don't buy any packaged sweets, But my mom did, Mmmm ho'hos' and Ding dongs !!!

http://science.howstuffworks.com/innovation/edible-innovations/twinkie2.htm

In the 1920s and '30s, Continental Bakeries sold baked snacks under the Hostess brand name. Many of the snacks were seasonal, with fruit filling. Hostess Little Shortbread Fingers were made with strawberries, so for several months of the year the equipment used to make them sat idle because strawberries weren't available.
The company vice president,James Dewar, wanted to make a product that could use that equipment and improve efficiency. His idea was a simple sponge cake with a flavored cream filling. On the way to a marketing meeting, he saw a billboard advertising Twinkle-Toe Shoes. And so, the Twinkie was born in 1930 [source: Hostess (http://www.hostesscakes.com/aboutus.asp)].


The first Twinkies were quite different from the ones we know. For one thing, they were made with banana cream filling, not vanilla. But in World War II, there was a banana shortage, and vanilla became the standard flavor. The eggs, milk and butter in early Twinkies gave them a shelf life of only two days. Dewar had his salesman replenish store shelves every other day, but the practice was expensive. So, the need for a longer shelf life led to many changes in the Twinkie recipe


Today's Twinkie has a much longer shelf life than the ones made in 1930, but not as long as some people think. A variety of myths and urban legends (http://people.howstuffworks.com/urban-legend.htm) have sprung up around the Twinkie's longevity, claiming that it stays fresh for decades, would survive a nuclear war and that the company is still selling off the original batch made in 1930, still fresh almost 80 years later. In fact, a Twinkie's shelf life is officially 25 days [source: Snopes (http://www.snopes.com/food/ingredient/twinkies.asp)]. It's also a misconception that Twinkies are chemically preserved. Most of the chemical ingredients are replacements for the ingredients that allow a Twinkie to spoil, but they aren't strictly preservatives. Replacing eggs, butter and fats (http://science.howstuffworks.com/innovation/edible-innovations/fat.htm) is what keeps Twinkies from going rancid. In fact, the airtight plastic packaging does far more to keep the cakes fresh than any of the actual ingredients do.
There are claims of Twinkies that have "lasted" for decades, such as one kept in a high school science classroom for 30 years [source: USA Today (http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2004-08-13-twinkie_x.htm)]. While it is true that the Twinkie continues to exist (like pretty much anything in a sealed plastic wrapper would), it is described as brittle. Reports that it is probably still edible are dubious, since no one seems willing to put that theory to the test.

[osoab]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13T0VhugGdA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13T0VhugGdA

[joboo]

Been 25 years since eating anything hostess. For some reason it just seemed obvious to me eating that crap was akin to treating your body like a sewer.

[JDRock]

this is just a test by tptb...the shiite will REALLY hit the fan when KFC closes and the watermelon shortage is reported....

[osoab]

Looks like they nipped the pension funds too. I guess the executives do deserve their bonus. Looks like they said they were not going to fund the pensions but they still kept the money from the checks. It went on for a year. So were they doing a Madoff and printing up phony pension statements? No overall total is given but it would be in the 60-80 million range easy.


Hostess Maneuver Deprived Pension (http://finance.yahoo.com/news/hostess-maneuver-deprived-pension-051400720.html)



Hostess Brands Inc. said it used wages that were supposed to help fund employee pensions for the company's operations as it sank toward bankruptcy.

It isn't clear how many of the Irving, Texas, company's workers were affected by the move or how much money never wound up in their pension plans as promised.

After the company said in August 2011 that it would stop making pension contributions, the foregone wages weren't put toward the pension. Nor were they restored.

The maker of Twinkies, Ho-Hos and Wonder Bread filed for bankruptcy protection in January and shut down last month following a strike by one of the unions representing Hostess workers. A judge is overseeing the sale of company assets.

Gregory Rayburn, Hostess's chief executive officer, said in an interview it is "terrible" that employee wages earmarked for the pension were steered elsewhere by the company.

"I think it's like a lot of things in this case," he added. "It's not a good situation to have."

Mr. Rayburn became chief executive in March and learned about the issue shortly before the company shut down, he said. "Whatever the circumstances were, whatever those decisions were, I wasn't there," he said.

A spokeswoman for Hostess's previous top executive, Brian Driscoll, declined to comment.

Hostess hasn't previously acknowledged that the foregone wages went toward its operations.

The maneuver probably doesn't violate federal law because the money Hostess failed to put into the pension didn't come directly from employees, experts said.

"It's what lawyers call betrayal without remedy," said James P. Baker, a partner at Baker & McKenzie LLP who specializes in employee benefits and isn't involved in the Hostess case. "It's sad, but that stuff does happen, unfortunately."

The decision to cease pension contributions angered many employees. After the bankruptcy filing, Hostess tangled with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco and Grain Millers International Union to renegotiate labor contracts.

While the Teamsters union agreed in September to a compromise, resistance from the bakers union was fierce.
Halted pension contributions were a major factor in the bakers union's refusal to make a deal with the company. After a U.S. bankruptcy judge granted Hostess's request to impose a new contract, the union's employees went on strike. Hostess then moved to liquidate the company.

The bakers union represented about 5,600 of the company's 18,500 employees.

"The company's cessation of making pension contributions was a critical component of the bakers' decision" to walk off the job, said Jeffrey Freund of Bredhoff & Kaiser PLLC, a lawyer for the union.

"If they had continued to fund the pension, I think we'd still be working there today," said Craig Davis, a 44-year-old forklift operator who loaded trucks with Twinkies, cupcakes and sweet rolls at an Emporia, Kan., bakery, for nearly 22 years.

Hostess's retirees receive payments mostly from so-called multiemployer pension plans. Such pensions get contributions from various companies in a particular industry. Hostess's pension plans still are making payouts to retirees.

Most companies provide pensions through single-employer plans that they fund themselves. When companies with these plans file for bankruptcy protection, they sometimes terminate the plans, leading the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., the government agency that insures corporate pensions, to take over the plans and make payouts to their retirees.

With the multiemployer plans from which most Hostess retirees receive benefits, the PBGC doesn't step in unless the plans become insolvent. If that happened, the PBGC would send roughly $12,870 for each employee with at least 30 years of service, according to an agency spokesman.

The Bakery & Confectionary Union & Industry International Pension Fund, the largest fund covering Hostess bakers, was 72% funded when Hostess stopped making contributions, the company said.

Teamster-represented employees at Hostess didn't contribute a portion of their wages toward pensions, a union spokesman said. But among workers in the bakers union, it was "standard practice," said Mr. Rayburn, Hostess's CEO.
Hostess had 115 different collective-bargaining agreements with employees represented by the bakers union. Each contract let those workers choose an amount of wages to direct to the pension plan.

For example, John Jordan, a union official and former Hostess employee, said workers at a Hostess factory in Biddeford, Maine, agreed to plow 28 cents of their 30-cents-an-hour wage increase in November 2010 into the pension plan. Hostess was supposed to take the additional 28 cents an hour and contribute it to the workers' pension plan.

"This local was very aggressive about saving for the future," he said.

Employees in Biddeford began directing wages toward pensions in 1955, and the amount grew to $4.28 an hour per employee.

Amounts varied by location, and it isn't clear how many unionized employee groups participated in the arrangement.
In five months before this past January's bankruptcy filing, the company missed payments to the main baker pension fund totaling $22.1 million, Mr. Freund said.

After that, forgone pension payments added up at a rate of $3 million to $4 million a month until Hostess formally rejected its contracts with the union. The figures include company contributions and employee wages that were earmarked for the pension, according to Mr. Freund.

Mr. Driscoll, the former Hostess chief executive, told employees in an August 2011 letter that the decision to "temporarily suspend" pension contributions was a "necessary bridge" to a larger plan to turn around Hostess.
In the fiscal year ended in May 2011, Hostess had a net loss of $341 million on sales of $2.5 billion.

As the company's financial condition deteriorated, "whatever cash it had was being used to fund the business, to keep it afloat," Mr. Rayburn said.

It might have been "impossible" to undo the agreements that called for Hostess to make pension contributions using employee money, Mr. Rayburn added. One reason: Hostess could have been too short of cash to make up the difference, though he said he isn't sure.

[chad]

that's awesome. work and pay in to it for 30 years, and then when the government run pbgc comes to rescue you, they give you $12,870. although, it is better than social security which you pay in to for maybe 45 years and then get nothing.

[mick silver]

i am so glad the ceo got there pay for driving the company in the dirt