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Snack Cakes Episode VI: Return of the Twinkies


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Silly Felix.

In Soviet Russia, Twinkie eats YOU!

thank god i'm not gonna be eaten by corn flour and icing

Oh, no. Just don't Twinkies. ww Edited by Woun
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Went all over hell the antelope valley, california yesterday to find some Twinkies and Cupcakes. stores were cleared out everywhere save for lesser known hostess snacks. finally found some at a korean liquor store. shared them with my brother and sister.

Sad I won't be eating one ever again if they won't get a last minute buy-out or something but at least we got to have 1 last one. keep this topic up-to-date on whats going on will ya guys?

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I don't quite understand the public outpouring of grief. Another company will just buy Hostess and continue producing Twinkies. It's just a change of ownership, nothing more, nothing less.

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I don't quite understand the public outpouring of grief. Another company will just buy Hostess and continue producing Twinkies. It's just a change of ownership, nothing more, nothing less.

You're right:

The tasty cream-filled golden spongecakes are likely to survive, even though their maker will be sold in bankruptcy court.

Hostess Brands Inc., baker of Wonder Bread as well as Twinkies, Ding Dongs and Ho Ho's, will be in a New York bankruptcy courtroom Monday to start the process of selling itself.

The company, weighed down by debt, management turmoil, rising labor costs and the changing tastes of America, decided on Friday that it no longer could make it through a conventional Chapter 11 bankruptcy restructuring. Instead, it's asking the court for permission to sell assets and go out of business.

But with high brand recognition and $2.5 billion in revenue per year, other companies are interested in bidding for at least pieces of Hostess. Twinkies alone have brought in $68 million in revenue so far this year, which would look good to another snack-maker.

"There's a huge amount of goodwill with the commercial brand name," said John Pottow, a University of Michigan Law School professor who specializes in bankruptcy. "It's quite conceivable that they can sell the name and recipe for Twinkies to a company that wants to make them."

Hostess has said it's received inquiries about buying parts of the company. But spokesman Lance Ignon would not comment on analysts' reports that Thomasville, Ga.-based Flowers Foods Inc. and private equity food investment firm Metropoulos & Co. are likely suitors. Metropoulos owns Pabst Brewing Co., while Flowers Foods makes Nature's Own bread, Tastykake treats and other baked goods. Messages were left for spokesmen for both companies on Sunday.

http://news.yahoo.co...1--finance.html

Edited by Pegasus Seiya
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I don't quite understand the public outpouring of grief. Another company will just buy Hostess and continue producing Twinkies. It's just a change of ownership, nothing more, nothing less.

The way I see it, it's more akin to brand vs generic. You can get a box of something, say Frosted Flakes or Cheerios from Kelloggs or General Mills, then buy the store's generic variant. They might be made the same, even right down to having the same amount of calories and sugar. They might even taste the same, but folks largely will think the brand version tastes better or the generic tastes different based on name recognition alone.

Secondly, I don't know how fast trademark rights are sold and moved through, and if it's anything as slow as regular court proceedings, there could be a reasonable gap between the last Hostess made Twinkies/goods and the start of a fresh patch from their new trademark right owners.

Thirdly - December 21, 2012. If it's really going to be the end of the world, and Twinkies suddenly stopped production nearly a month before it, people are kinda right to be freaked out. XD

Edited by KittyNakajima
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The way I see it, it's more akin to brand vs generic. You can get a box of something, say Frosted Flakes or Cheerios from Kelloggs or General Mills, then buy the store's generic variant. They might be made the same, even right down to having the same amount of calories and sugar. They might even taste the same, but folks largely will think the brand version tastes better or the generic tastes different based on name recognition alone.

Exactly this right here! Hostess and their products are one of the most well known brands in America. To see it go out of business is quite a loss. While I don't doubt that someone will take over and continue making the products considering how popular they are, people may think that it's not going to be the same since it's not under the Hostess name anymore.

Some recent news though, a judge has agreed to allow Hostess and the Baker's Union to enter into mediation, so it may not just be the end just yet.

Twinkies and other Hostess products have been selling out quick here and understandably so. I just recently had a Twinkie myself (we only have a few left) to give tribute. It'll be a huge shame if the products Hostess makes will be gone for good.

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In case the deal falls through, there's reportedly some interested buyers in the Hostess brand.

Twinkies May Find Buyer, Hostess CEO Says

Hostess Brands, the maker of the iconic Twinkies snack cakes, may find a buyer when it heads to bankruptcy court today to liquidate the 82-year-old company, the company’s CEO says.

“I think we’ll find buyers,” CEO Gregory F. Rayburn told ABC News on Sunday. ”A few have surfaced already since Friday expressing interest in the brand to acquire them.”

Con Agra and Flowers Foods are among the companies that have expressed interest in Hostess, but Mexican company El Grupo Bimbo may have an edge, the Christian Science Monitor reported Saturday. Grupo Bimbo, headed by Mexican billionaire Daniel Servitje Montull, is the largest bread-baking company in the world.

Economists say part of the reason Hostess struggled was due to high sugar tariffs meant to protect local producers, the Monitor reported. Grupo Bimbo could take advantage of lower sugar prices in Mexico.

Hostess makes Twinkies as well as popular snacks including Ho Hos, Ding Dongs, Suzy Qs, Sno Balls and Wonder Bread.

Last week the company announced it would close after it imposed wage and benefit cuts to its workers, prompting a bitter nationwide strike.

“The problem has always been the cost structure, the union rules, the pension legacy, the pension cost and the cost structure,” Rayburn told ABC Sunday.

On Friday he announced the company would close, saying in a statement: “We deeply regret the necessity of today’s decision, but we do not have the financial resources to weather an extended nationwide strike. Hostess Brands will move promptly to lay off most of its 18,500-member workforce and focus on selling its assets to the highest bidders.”

Frank Hurt, president of the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers Union told the Wall Street Journal that there’s “more than a good chance” someone would swoop in to buy the company’s 30 brands and preserve jobs. He said that Twinkies and Wonder Bread are popular and they will be “produced somewhere, some time and by our members.”

The company’s sales had dropped over the years as mothers began swapping healthier choices to the fat-filled snack cakes and white bread. It filed for bankruptcy twice – once in 2004 and again in January.

Over the weekend, Americans who were panicked over news of the company’s closure cleared the shelves of Twinkies. The cream-filled sponge cakes were in many cases re-offered for sale online at exorbitant mark-ups.

On eBay Sunday night, some ambitious sellers were listing the product for several hundred thousand dollars up to several million. One seller even offered a box of Twinkies for $15,000,000.

“It’s pandemic out here. Everybody’s going to grab the Hostess,” one man said, describing the sentiment.

In the last few days, several people have posted new do-it-yourself Twinkie recipe videos on YouTube.

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/business/2012/11/twinkies-may-find-buyer-hostess-ceo-says/

vHxCs.jpg

Edited by Gabby
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You know something stupid? This could have all been prevented if the damn union workers weren't such greedy bastards. They wanted more money even though Hostess wasn't making as much as they could have. And now? They don't have a job at all and Twinkies are endangered.

To any union workers who went through with this, I want to smack you upside the head.

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In my entire life I've only had one twinky because my Uncle got some when he came back from America.

Darn it, now I'll never ever get the chance to have one again!

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You know something stupid? This could have all been prevented if the damn union workers weren't such greedy bastards. They wanted more money even though Hostess wasn't making as much as they could have. And now? They don't have a job at all and Twinkies are endangered.

To any union workers who went through with this, I want to smack you upside the head.

I've seen something on Tumblr about the admins giving themselves a 300% bonus while it was falling through though, so I don't think the loss was entirely on the workers. Oftentimes, it isn't usually solely down to one person or group.

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You know something stupid? This could have all been prevented if the damn union workers weren't such greedy bastards. They wanted more money even though Hostess wasn't making as much as they could have. And now? They don't have a job at all and Twinkies are endangered.

To any union workers who went through with this, I want to smack you upside the head.

Yes, striking union workers​ are responsible for the last decade of financial mismanagement, executive greed and awful worker pay (and, IIRC, conditions?), so kindly brought to us by Hostess' management.

24zxfl0.gif

If the only way that Hostess can remain in business is by systematically screwing its workers over while giving its top brass big fat bonuses for doing fuck all to better the business, then maybe it deserves to go under and maybe that's just the right damn thing to do.

As somebody posting on my Facebook feed said...

I wonder when the media will report that, while Hostess was trying to cut Bakers' pay by 8%, and benefits by 32%, their CEO gave himself a 300% raise.

Nine Hostess executives received 60% to over 100% raises, while filing for their second bankruptcy.

Meanwhile, they stopped paying into the employees' pension, owing them over $160,000,000.

But yes... let's blame the 18,000 workers making less than $20 an hour for the fact that Hostess had to close its doors.

Anti-union talk... eurgh, no.

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Yes, striking union workers​ are responsible for the last decade of financial mismanagement, executive greed and awful worker pay (and, IIRC, conditions?), so kindly brought to us by Hostess' management.

24zxfl0.gif

If the only way that Hostess can remain in business is by systematically screwing its workers over while giving its top brass big fat bonuses for doing fuck all to better the business, then maybe it deserves to go under and maybe that's just the right damn thing to do.

As somebody posting on my Facebook feed said...

Anti-union talk... eurgh, no.

There's that and the fact that Hostess was essentially dealing with several different unions for the workers in general, and had different contracts detailing what various workers could and couldn't do on the job. One example of this that I've been hearing pertains to the delivery of their goods. Say a shipment of Hostess Goods like Twinkies, Cupcakes, and HoHos are all going to the same stores in the same area, as well as other brands such as Drake and Wonder Bread. One would think that they could load enough of each item on one or two trucks to unload at the different stores, right?

Wrong. They actually require a separate truck solely for Hostess snack brands, and another solely for Wonder Bread. And you'd think the drivers would help unload the product too, but they actually have it written out that someone else is required to unload.

It seems a bit weird, but with things like that and various other demands from the many different unions, it was probably hard for Hostess to sustain a working and profitable business model without cutting. Not excusing the executives (since taking 100 - 300% bonuses in the mist of a financial crisis is pretty douche), but something had to give.

I also don't think either side tried hard enough to save those jobs. The Hostess CEO and execs for turning a blind eye to how many people would be immediately affected, and the union for not calling off the strike once immediate unemployment was imminent. I get that shit was gradually being whittled out of their paychecks while the execs' ones got fatter, but in this economy, I would have taken the pay cut. Jobs are still hard to come by, and unemployment is, from my experience, a very drawn out process whether you qualify or not.

Then again, maybe I'm being a bit harsh as I don't work a union job. This type of walking out shit in retail is easily grounds for termination on the spot whether you're right or not.

Edited by KittyNakajima
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Never had a twinkie before but I did buy the last bit of Hoho's from my jobs vending machine since I do enjoy those a little. Other than people being out of work, I can't say that I care too much that Hostess is now gone. I'm pretty sure another company will either buy the hostess name or recipes and come out with their own twinkies in no time.

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  • 3 months later...

I haven't missed Twinkies. In fact, the fact that they have been gone has prevented the temptation to buy any from arising inside me.

I don't know if its rebirth is necessarily a good thing.

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twinkies-meme-generator-no-twinkies-afte

 

No seriously; don't really miss them--just didn't care much for hostess stuff.

Edited by Death the Kid
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  • 3 months later...

I know that this is a stereotype, but I can honestly see in my mind's eye all those obese people shopping at my wife's Walmart, who are on disability even though they could work if they had to (seriously, they get $200 of shopping there every single day, I can only imagine how much fraud they're all committing), gathering up large piles of Twinkie boxes in their mobility scooters come the day of their return, and paying for them with food stamp cards.

Edited by Patticus
Tornado corrected me. :)
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Jim-Carey_Excited.gif

 

This pleases me. I wasn't much of a Twinkie eater in the past beyond buying them occasionally, but it's nice to know that something that's been part of the culture of 'murrica for so long still gets to live on.

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I know that this is a stereotype, but I can honestly see in my mind's eye all those obese people shopping at my wife's Walmart, who are on disability even though they could work if they had to (seriously, they get $200 of shopping there every single day, I can only imagine how much fraud they're all committing), gathering up large piles of Twinkie boxes in their shopping carts come the day of their return, and paying for them with food stamp cards.

Yeah that is some serious stereotyping, we all don't abuse the system like that and I hate the abusing asshats who do make the rest of us who need it look bad. makes me wish I could stab the fucks you described.

I miss Twinkies so much I could just die.

Well you won't have to wait much longer will ya? tongue.png

Edited by goku262002
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