Say goodbye to Twinkies (9 Viewers)

[SWJJ]

this story is analagous to what is happening to our country.

I agree the rich and powerful have mismanaged things for decades and now that it's time to pay the piper thy blame the little man instead of decades of bad business (policy).

 

[livefromDC]

Well I guess there's no arguing with that. You're talking about who was at fault for leaving the barn door open. I'm talking about what are you going to do now that the horse is speeding away.

No, I'm not. You're assuming these striking workers just unwittingly and greedily decided to strike without thinking about their future. Seriously, you're naive if you think these people haven't contemplated this move. You've known about this for about a day now and now you talk as if you have deeply considered how this is going to effect these people over the long term more than the people themselves. The striking workers know better than all of us what predicament Hostess was in. They made the decision to push Hostess to this point. I think its incredibly arrogant of you to think you understand the decision better than the workers that have been mulling over this.

But without even a second glance, you've decided that 92% of their pay is enough to continue. I'm curious as to what number would it have taken for you to think the strikers were justified? 90, 80, 70%? 50% is still better than nothing?

Honestly, you all are making determinations of these people's worth independently of knowing what the market dictates their worth would be given that they worked for a healthy company.

Hostess has plenty of competitors in the market place. Many of them were named in this thread. Your comment seems to imply that you excpect some other company to come in buy everything Hostess has, walk right in the next day and turn it all on with all these people getting their jobs back.

I don't see that happening and, even in the remote chance that it will happen like that, it isn't going to happen for quite some time.

More like of the scenarios is that a number of companies come in a buy up Hostess' machinery, recipes, etc. When people are buying things off piecemeal like that, they are unlikely to be restarting the factories.

I don't expect another company to come in and open the factory. Really? Stop patronizing me. I expect Hostess' share of the market to go elsewhere. I expect other companies to grab at that market share. I expect other companies to expand to meet the demand created by the void left when a company of 18,000 employees shut its doors.

The employees probably figured out that as long as Hostess is operating (meanwhile paying its employees 8% less), other bakery companies likely do not have as many openings because the market remains unchanged. The employees pushed Hostess to pay them, hire replacement, or close its doors. They turned down the last deal Hostess offered forcing the company to close its doors. I have a hard time believing that the employees didn't see this as an option. They were striking! They knew that they weren't getting paid. They knew the history of the company. They had to know what the alternative was going to be. I will give them the benefit of the doubt. They looked at how managment had been running the company and realized that unless Hostess dramatically changed its positions, the workers would be better off on strike. The evidence that they are likely right is overwhelming. Hostess closed its doors instead of hiring replacements. That doesn't send off alarms to you? They couldn't hire replacements at the wages they were offering, or worse still, couldn't afford to hire replacements.

Whats with this stance of keeping terribly run business open at all costs mentality? Let them die and let a better business enter the market or claim the market share.

 

[DesertKajun]

I'm curious where you got the 55k a year number? At 12 an hour working 60 a week assuming 1.5 for over time that's ~ $43500 And that's working 60 hours a week every week.

I also did not see where the CEO was working for $1.00 a year.

You are clearly making up half the stuff you post, and copy and pasting the other half.

Try google and a little reading. That's what I did it has more news reports then I can read to find it again. Your union mentality is at least consistent you assume one baker makes 12 bucks an hour so they all must be equal. Maybe that one was new or just sucked at his job. News report showed it averaged at 55k. Now ask the HR department how much they cost after all the taxes and such...Usually a lot more then their gross pay.

 

[chad141fa]

But now the grass does get mowed either.

Who loses more?

A factory worker losing his $12 an hour factory job or the owner of a multimillion dollar business who has to close the doors cause he can't come to an agreement with the labor.

LOL. Multimillion dollars =set so it dosent matter unlike the grass cutter who MUST still make a living

 

[SWJJ]

Say a group of 50 bakers get together to do it and yes 10k is pocket change on the grand scheme of things. And I said for the lease, the rest is probably in the 80k ballpark I would guess minimum.

I paid 60k for my Shop (on loans), after all the tax grabbers from the city hit me(planned 5k cash but underestimated opening taxes and permits big time) I had a few hundred to buy livestock. I made it after a few very harsh months and hard work. But I swear I almost went away for murder when the city sign tax guy came to measure the sq ft on my sign to determine the 500 buck tax on it a year.

You better sell a lot of cupcakes to split profits 50 ways.

Just stop. Your personal testimony disproves your assessment that it's easy and inexpensive to start your own business.

 

[SWJJ]

LOL. Multimillion dollars =set so it dosent matter unlike the grass cutter who MUST still make a living

The multimillion dollar portion includes assets, and is not a liquid number.

The grass cutter can cut grass elsewhere.


Again ridiculous posts are ridiculous.

 

[chad141fa]

The multimillion dollar portion includes assets, and is not a liquid number.

The grass cutter can cut grass elsewhere.


Again ridiculous posts are ridiculous.

Where ??? Just like that they will move in on all the jobs available currently

 

[livefromDC]

He could accept that or ...guess what, now he makes no money

You should be more concerned about your lawn that isn't getting cut. Tsk tsk tsk, step away from the lawn mower, sir. Remember this is an analogy. You can't cut the grass and because of upkeep you are now forced to sell off your property to the highest bidder. It may take awhile to sell, but heck it may not. Keeping with the analogy, you do have a piece of property (twinkies) that lots of people would hate to see go to waste. Want to know what happens next? Someone else will buy your property and will need someone to cut the grass. Enter the kid that used to cut the grass for you.

 

[cdogg]

I'm a bread man with a different company, the merita/hostess guy on my route found out through a text message from while he was on the route. Now there is only us and Bimbo left in the market of any real merit.

 

[chad141fa]

You should be more concerned about your lawn that isn't getting cut. Tsk tsk tsk, step away from the lawn mower, sir. Remember this is an analogy. You can't cut the grass and because of upkeep you are now forced to sell off your property to the highest bidder. It may take awhile to sell, but heck it may not. Keeping with the analogy, you do have a piece of property (twinkies) that lots of people would hate to see go to waste. Want to know what happens next? Someone else will buy your property and will need someone to cut the grass. Enter the kid that used to cut the grass for you.

The point is I dont need the grass or the equipment if its more issue than it is worth.

 

[You]

It always comes down to the same thing.

Unions claim that Management are idiots and ruined the company with debt. The workers should get paid more for doing the "Work".

When they don't get what they want, they strike and hope it puts so much pressure on the company that they cave in and give the workers what they want. I think generally it gets worked out. In this case, the company said "Screw it" and shut its doors.

Now there are probably a lot of issues playing into it; bad economy, change in appetite, bad acquisitions etc but the union issue is a part of it. It's the final straw.

Hostess is a private company so I don't know it's financials but I've gleaned that they had assets of almost a billion at the beginning of the year. They had liabilities of 1.43 billion. Included in that is debt of just under 900 million. Not good. Part of those liabilities were pension obligations to workers.

At the end of the day, the workers are always going to get hurt when a company shuts down and with 18,000 workers it's a huge expense that will have to be tweaked if a company is to stay afloat. Evidently the 5,000 unionized workers were enough make a difference... And they did.

So closing the doors is probably what needs to happen here.

 

[Sun Wukong]

At the end of the day, the workers are always going to get hurt when a company shuts down and with 18,000 workers it's a huge expense that will have to be tweaked if a company is to stay afloat. Evidently the 5,000 unionized workers were enough make a difference... And they did.

If you read up on the situation, they really aren't. This is a company that expanded at the wrong time and has been destined to fail for a while now. They're just using the union as scapegoat.

 

[Utah Saints]

I agree the rich and powerful have mismanaged things for decades and now that it's time to pay the piper thy blame the little man instead of decades of bad business (policy).

This is exactly what happened. These companies make profit hand over fist, destroy all their competition, make risky overseas investments with nepotistic bankers giving their friends kids corporate loans, and do it for decades, but as soon as workers require so much as a bone thrown in their direction, the whole thing comes crashing down. And labor is to blame. lol.

If the market were rational, corporations weren't allowed to buy up and destroy all their competition, and banking was done fairly in a reformed banking system, you would have another company spring up immediately where Hostess fell, and labor costs would reset, jobs would be created, we would have a new brand of tasty treat, and these issues wouldn't be so threatening on a case by case basis.

 

[Sun Wukong]

Forbes lays blame squarely on mismanagement of the company. As they should, because that's what this is all about. Not the "evil unions."

What Killed Hostess Brands and Twinkies? - Forbes

 

[You]

Forbes lays blame squarely on mismanagement of the company. As they should, because that's what this is all about. Not the "evil unions."

What Killed Hostess Brands and Twinkies? - Forbes

And they're going out of business... Exactly what SHOULD happen here.

So what?