Posted on 04/24/2007 8:21:11 AM PDT by Wolfie
Hershey to Close Reading, Pa., Plant
The Hershey Co., the nation's leading candy maker, said Monday that it will shut down a plant in Reading as part of a wider move to cut labor and materials costs.
The closing, which will affect about 260 unionized employees, is the company's second plant-closing announcement in a little over two months.
"Our network operates at less than half of capacity (over seven days) and we must make significant changes to remain competitive," Hershey (nyse: HSY - news - people ) spokesman Kirk Saville said.
Saville said the company would work out severance agreements with the workers and close the plant in 2008. Hershey is looking to shift more manufacturing to India, China, Mexico and contractors in the United States, and has already announced it will cut up to 900 of the 3,000 workers from three plants in its hometown.
Hershey originally purchased the Reading plant from the Dietrich Corp. in 1987 and brought aboard the Luden's cough drop brand and the Fifth Avenue chocolate bar.
The plant also makes York Peppermint Patties, Reese's crispy crunch bars and Jolly Ranchers. The plant is about 40 miles east of the company headquarters in the town named for the chocolate magnate, Milton S. Hershey.
What union? Everybody in China is a part of the union, ultimately. They don’t have the union dues scam going there, separate from taxes. They are at least honest.
1) I am not in a union, nor have I ever been
2) I have seen first hand the laziness and entitlement culture that unions can produce.
All this being said the only form of life I see as much lower than union gravy swilling do nothings is greedy anti American free-traitors. They wanna move to china *fine* but they have no right to operate a factory there and trade without tariff to the US.
I think its safe to say you make your living exporting jobs and don't care if the average American is a serf working at walmart. Put down the NAFTA news letter and stop quoting Bill Clinton with his love of china free trade.
S’OK — round about Halloween, when a bunch of kids get sick from eating China-made, melamine-tainted chocolate, Hershey’s will be taking it up their highway in lawsuits.
I'm not so sure of that. The cost per ton-mile of shipping from China in containers is supposed to be very cheap.
I don't have the numbers, but it would be interesting to figure out the cost of transportation for a Hershey bar from China, given the cost per ton-mile and the weight of the bar. I'll bet it's not much.
Maybe you can share your experiences in the high echelons of corporate management with the rest of us?
They’re union commies. They drive up costs far too much thinking they’re worth more than they are - including getting infinite breaks, leave, etc.
That’s what you get when you insist your work is worth more than it ever is. You lose it.
Refrigerated containers?
Or the steel industry.
Oh come on now. Low wages in China have very little to do with corporate decisions.
Yes, we all believe this....Of course.
Not that they would care.
You do understand that we already subsidize sugar and slap quotas on the sugar coming-in, don’t you? Why are people focused like laser beams on the labor portion of the cost equation? What about raw materials?
No one pays more than they have to for anything. Goods, labor, services. If the coffe cost $1.25, that’s what you’ll pay. You won’t offer $2.00. Same with Hershey. Why should they pay more for labor than they have to? It’s a business, in it to make money. If the unions have priced themselves out of a job, then they priced themselves out of a job (see: UAW, Detroit). That’s why it’s outsourced. My point is, no one complaining about outsourcing voluntarily pays more for anything, yet they expect a company to do so.
Can you believe those greedy managers don't want to pay triple for raw materials! They should pay that price because the government says so!
I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that Hershey won’t “just” raise the price of their candy by ten cents because it is in the business of selling candy.
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