Many of these companies probably already own their own bakeries and only need the brand name rights and recipes.
You're exactly right in that many highly interested buyers will be existing novelty food bakers. In fact, some could already bake Hostess products on a toll basis. The equipment used for novelty baking is generic and to swap from one product to another simply means a recipe change, different pans, different oven conditions, packaging, etc.
These bakeries basically schedule production for a 1 day run that will be about 10 to 14 hours of production, 6 hours of sanitation that includes disassembly of a lot of of the equipment and last reconfiguring the equipment and preparing new batters, etc.