Those unions watching out for their workers...

[kermit]

If your cost of production is such that you cannot compete, no amount of marketing is going to help.

In most industries union employees cost little if any more than non-union employees. I came from the manufacturing sector and of 80ish US plants about 5 were union. The wages at those plants were below our average.

 

[kermit]

The Bakers Union are the ones who pulled the trigger so yeah... it gets laid at their feet.

So if I pile huge weights on you and you stand and then someone else puts another weight on and you collapse. Does the fault only lie with the second person? That's what being claimed here.

You'll note that I never defended the Bakers Union actions. I only stated that the bulk of the blame hardly lies with them.

 

[Thekla]

Here's a more detailed account of " the Twinkie Woes"

Hostess is bankrupt … again - Fortune Management

 

[kermit]

Here's a more detailed account of " the Twinkie Woes"

Hostess is bankrupt … again - Fortune Management

Thanks you for finding an article that talks about the issue without reportng to finger pointing.

 

[keith99]

Heck, historically even #3 doesn't tend to happen.

Or not on net.

Honestly I have never seen the kind of things Unions talk about in any work situation I have been in.

BUT

I have never worked in a situation where the workers were commodities. By an dlarge where i have worked you could not even come close to grabbing someone off the street and plugging them in to the job. And even if you found someone with the resume that is a great fit it would be at least 3 months before someone would START to be productive.

In that environment companies try to keep people.

If you can grab someone off the street and have them up in a month or get someone experienced and have them up within a day then it really does not matter much if poeple l;eave, as long as there are others looking for that job.

AND workers even in the most simple of jobs are not total fools, they have friends and people talk, they know when there are lots of people looking. And at those times few will leave unless they have something lined up.

 

[keith99]

If your cost of production is such that you cannot compete, no amount of marketing is going to help.

That is incorrect, unless you mean it as a tautology or think of marketing as just advertising.

Marketing also involves what product lines exist. I think a strong argument can be made that the Hostess product line has failed to change and now is attractive only to a demographic that is not willing or able to spend more for what they want.

It has been over a decade since I have bought a loaf of bread in the "Wonder Bread" category. And I bet if I counted all the rest of their products I purchased in the last decade I would not need to take off my shoes.

Remaining in a dying and very competitive part of the market is a marketing failure.

Appologies to Hostess execs if they have created new product lines that are not associated with the name. Well partial appology, if they did such recently not being associated with the Hostess name is a good idea, but that it is a good idea also indicates they likely waited too long before doing it.

 

[keith99]

So if I pile huge weights on you and you stand and then someone else puts another weight on and you collapse. Does the fault only lie with the second person? That's what being claimed here.

You'll note that I never defended the Bakers Union actions. I only stated that the bulk of the blame hardly lies with them.

I'd be more inclined to agree with you if the Teamsters had also rejected the offer on the table. The Teamsters are not known as a patsy union.

And reading through things here it seems there is a good chance that union leadership made a major misrepresentation relative to a buyer being out there somewhere and the general situation in the industry.

 

[Maynard Keenan]

The Bakers Union are the ones who pulled the trigger so yeah... it gets laid at their feet.

The company pulled the trigger on cutting wages. Why must employees accept whatever the company wants to do to them, or else it's their fault? There is such an imbalance in this country, where we have come to view labor as an expendable commodity that should be thankful to get anything at all and never complain if they get less?

 

[mathetes123]

The company pulled the trigger on cutting wages. Why must employees accept whatever the company wants to do to them, or else it's their fault? There is such an imbalance in this country, where we have come to view labor as an expendable commodity that should be thankful to get anything at all and never complain if they get less?

The problem is the entitlement mentality where people think they have a right to a job. The jobs belong to the owners of the companies who took the risks and put their blood sweat and tears into building the businesses. As my boss says, if the employee doesn't like his situation, he can find another situation (or build his own company).

 

[Maynard Keenan]

The "entitlement mentality" sure hasn't led to better wages over the past 30 years. Real wage growth pretty much stopped around that time and those poor oppressed job creators have been netting pretty much ALL of the gains of economic growth during that period. Corporate profits are the highest as a % of gdp EVER. Yet they still want more, and want to CUT employee wages and make people work for less, as little as they can get away with. And the employees are the entitled ones? Workers are the problem? This is yet another issue on which "conservative reality" is nothing but a fantasy.

 

[TerranceL]

The company pulled the trigger on cutting wages. Why must employees accept whatever the company wants to do to them, or else it's their fault? There is such an imbalance in this country, where we have come to view labor as an expendable commodity that should be thankful to get anything at all and never complain if they get less?

If the company is unable to survive with the wages the employees want the employees either take cuts of as we see here lose their jobs.

 

[kermit]

The problem is the entitlement mentality where people think they have a right to a job.

And the problem is entitlement mentality that employers believe that employees should be happy with whatever they get.

The jobs belong to the owners of the companies who took the risks and put their blood sweat and tears into building the businesses.

Wrong. A job is a contract between and employer and and employee. Employees incur the risk that employer knows how to run a business well. Employers incur the rish that the employee will not yeild an ROI.

As my boss says, if the employee doesn't like his situation, he can find another situation (or build his own company).

I've seen many a business fold due to this mentality.

 

[kermit]

If the company is unable to survive with the wages the employees want the employees either take cuts of as we see here lose their jobs.

This situation didn't occur in a vacuum.

Also, given the history, even if the Bakers Union had agreed it's likely that agreement would have only briefly halted the inevitable.

 

[[serious]]

The company blames it on the union. however, ask yourself this:

When is the last time you saw someone eat a twinkie? It's been years for me. Likewise with wonderbread. They are trying to sell products that are simply no longer in demand. It's the exact same thing that happened with the American auto industry. they wanted to keep making the same cars after people stopped wanting to buy them.

 

[pgp_protector]

Time to stock up on Twinkies & freeze them.
Wait about a year when people start missing them & put em on E-Bay

Aww I'm too late

10 Boxes of Twinkies | eBay

10 boxes of Twinkies Starting bid:US $1,500,000.00

 

[Thekla]

If the company is unable to survive with the wages the employees want the employees either take cuts of as we see here lose their jobs.

The company has been through 6 CEOs in less than ten years, failed to use the wage cuts layoffs etc. agreed to by the unions and the debt the co. piled on to upgrade facilities (as promised), angered their investors and employees by giving top mgmt. 80% pay raises as the company was crumbling ... ya think this was entirely the result of employee wages ?

Their competitor, Bimbo Bakeries USA, has union employees and isn't bankrupt.

This sounds like a Hostess investor and mgmt. problem ...

 

[mathetes123]

The company has been through 6 CEOs in less than ten years, failed to use the wage cuts layoffs etc. agreed to by the unions and the debt the co. piled on to upgrade facilities (as promised), angered their investors and employees by giving top mgmt. 80% pay raises as the company was crumbling ... ya think this was entirely the result of employee wages ?

Their competitor, Bimbo Bakeries USA, has union employees and isn't bankrupt.

This sounds like a Hostess investor and mgmt. problem ...

It's a good thing we live in a free country where those employees have the option of leaving Twinkies and going to Bimbo Bakeries.

 

[DaisyDay]

Right, because those lousy unions should have accepted the status quo of management getting 30-80+% increases while being asked to take an 8% decrease, as that is capitalism at work.

Workers demanding to be compensated appropriately? That, to those who shout the praises of capitalism from the rooftops, is somehow wrong.

Hostess is bankrupt again - Fortune Management

The critical issue in the bankruptcy is legacy pensions. Hostess has roughly $2 billion in unfunded pension liabilities to its various unions' workers -- the Teamsters but also the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union (which has largely chosen not to contest what Hostess wants to do -- that is, to get out of much of that obligation). If the bankruptcy court lets Hostess off the pension hook -- which often happens in these cases -- it only moves the struggle outside the courthouse, and the ante goes up.

.

 

[Thekla]

Hostess is bankrupt again - Fortune Management.

It's a great deal more than the pension problem (which was in part caused by Hostess reneging on its obligation to continue pension payments).

Imo, even if the Union/s had taken more paycuts, Hostess was doomed.

I wouldn't be surprised if a competitor, or other investors, are waiting for a fire-sale price on the WonderBread and Twinkies lines.

Given Hostess' product line, and greater consumer awareness about nutritional value, it doesn't seem like they could remain a stand-alone company anyway (see their sales trends in the article ...)

 

[Vylo]

So a company willing to give its CEO a 300% raise, goes bankrupt because the workers strike.......riiiiight.