Twinkies are returning to store shelves this July, according to the brand’s new owners, hedge funds Apollo Global Management and Metropoulos & Co., who formed the new Hostess Brands, LLC.
Twinkies stopped production in November when Hostess Brands Inc. filed for bankruptcy following a lengthy standoff with the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union.
The old Hostess company has almost completely wound its operations down. Along with selling the bulk of Hostess Snacks and brands to the new Hostess Brands LLC, the company also sold other lines like Wonder Bread to affiliates of Flowers Foods . Meanwhile, the company’s Beefstake bread brand was purchased by Grupo Binbo, S.A.B. de C.V.
The new Hostess Brands LLC executive vice president, Michael Cramer, announced on Thursday that Twinkies will return to store shelves in the United States by late July. Cramer explained, “We expect to be making and selling in July. Probably the later half of the month before the product hits the stores.”
So, all you Twinkie hoarders out there, you can start carefully rationing out your remaining snack cakes to last until July. Also, you can stop selling them on eBay . The new Hostess will start hiring 200 workers this weekend for the Dolly Madison Bakery in Columbus, Georgia — one of the locations closed down in November.
Along with Georgia, the new company also purchased plants in Schiller Park, Illinois; Emporia, Kansas; Indianapolis, Indiana; and the Atwater Village section of Los Angeles, California. Emporia is already hiring and will likely be among the locations reopened. Corporate operations for the new Hostess will be run out of both Kansas City and Dallas.
Cramer added during a news conference in Georgia that the Columbus plant will eventually create more than 300 jobs. When the snack-cake factory closed last November, there were 420 names on the payroll. But then the Dallas, Texas-based Hostess Brands Inc. closed its entire US production and distribution network and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
Along with the return of Twinkies, the other classic Hostess brands like Ho Hos, Zingers, and Ding Dongs, will return in August and September.
Are you excited that Twinkies are returning to store shelves?
