"Thompson blasts Stella D'oro sale," YourNabe.com, 9/25/09
On Thursday, September 17, City Comptroller Bill Thompson warned snack-food firm Lance, Inc. not to shift production of Stella D’oro snacks from the Bronx to Ohio.
Lance bought the Stella D’oro brand from Brynwood Partners in early September, bad news for more than 130 Stella D’oro union workers, on strike from August 2008 to July 2009. Read more.
"Pols looking to keep Stella equipment," The Riverdale Press, 9/24/09
Local politicians may not be able to keep Stella D’oro factory jobs in the Bronx, but they will try to keep the factory owners from taking the baking equipment with them when they go.
Rep. Eliot Engel, Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz and City Councilman Oliver Koppell sent a joint letter to the city’s Department of Finance commissioner, saying that Lance Inc., which plans to buy Stella D’oro from Brynwood Partners, should not be allowed to move manufacturing equipment bought with tax abatement dollars from new York to Ohio. Read more.
"Firm has a golden opportunity to do the right thing for Stella D'oro workers," The New York Daily News, 9/24/09
Hoping for a miracle, workers from the Bronx-based Stella D'Oro bakery will hold a 5 p.m. rally tomorrow at the Broad St. headquarters of Goldman Sachs in a last-ditch effort to save nearly 150 badly needed jobs.
Early next month the company will lay off its entire workforce, with plans to sell the business to the North Carolina-based firm Lance, Inc. Then the plan is to move the factory - lock, stock and barrel - to Ohio. Read more.
The nurses of the New York State Nurses Association (NYSNA) have entered the struggle to keep Stella D'oro in the Bronx in a big way. You can read the union's recent letter to Goldman Sachs, one of Lance, Inc.'s high-profile investors, here. NYSNA is threatening to divest from Goldman if they continue to support Lance as it moves to close the Stella D'oro plant in the Bronx and relocate production to a non-union facility in Ohio.
"Stella D'oro Workers Battle the Buyout," The Indypendent, 9/18/09
It seems that the Bronx produces some tough cookies.
The 136 workers at the Stella D’oro Biscuit Co. say they will not back down in the battle to save their jobs that disappear in early October.
After a June 30 ruling by the National Labor Relations Board gave the workers victory in an 11-month strike over proposed wage cuts, they are now fighting to keep the company’s owner, Connecticut-based private equity firm Brynwood Partners, from shuttering the Bronx factory and moving their jobs out of state. Read more.
On September 8, big business dropped a bombshell on NYC labor: anti-union Lance, Inc.—a junk food maker based in North Carolina—is buying Stella D'oro. If the deal moves forward, the Bronx plant will be shut -- and its unionized workers, who have waged a crucial struggle for more than a year, will be dumped on the street.
This Friday, September 25th, we'll be demonstrating outside Goldman Sachs, one of Lance, Inc.'s high-profile investors, to pressure them to tell Lance to do the right thing: either call off the deal or agree to maintain production in the Bronx plant.
All out to the protest at Goldman Sachs, 85 Broad Street (4 or 5 train to Bowling Green)
Friday, September 25th at 5pm
MARCH: immediately following, to City Hall!
Download the PDF flyer here.
"Plant to close, but Stella D'oro workers fight on," Riverdale Press, 9/17/09
It’s not over until the last cookie has been mixed, baked and packed.
That’s the attitude of Stella D’oro workers who last week found out that Stella D’oro Biscuit Co. entered into an agreement with Lance Inc. to sell the brand to the North Carolina–based company that would move operations to Ohio. Read more.
"Respaldo a trabajadores," El Diario La Prensa, 9/13/09
EL BRONX — En el desfile anual del Día del Trabajo miles de sindicalistas, incluyendo los trabajadores de la fábrica de galletas Stella D’Oro, marcharon ayer sobre la Quinta avenida en honor a los derechos de los trabajadores.
“No es suficiente cuidar las compañías, hay que proteger a los trabajadores”, aseguró Stuart Appelbaum, presidente del sindicato UFCW que representa a los empleados de la industria alimenticia. Appelbaum se unió en la marcha a los 400 sindicatos que representan a más de 1.3 millones de trabajadores en la ciudad. Lee más.
"High-finance low-lifes: Fast money tactics have killed 136 jobs at Stella D'oro," The New York Daily News, 9/13/09
High-flying investors who bought the Stella D'Oro bakery and set out to get fatter and happier on the backs of the workers have given New York a lesson in the economic forces buffeting wage earners.
Some 14.9 million Americans are out of work and many with jobs are making less than they did 10 years ago. Median household income dropped 3.6% last year alone to $50,303. That wiped out the financial gains made by American families since 1998. Read more.
"Bronx Cookie Bakers Fight Runaway Owner, Think Big to Save Jobs," Labor Notes, 9/11/09
Two months after returning to their jobs on the heels of a victorious 11-month strike against deep concession demands, the defiant workers at the Bronx-based Stella D’oro Biscuit Co. are at it again. This time, however, they are not walking out of their plant—they are trying to stay in it.
On Wednesday, the company’s union-busting owner, the private equity firm Brynwood Partners, said it had reached a deal to sell Stella D’oro, and that production will be relocated to Ohio by early October.
If successful, the move will leave the plant’s 136 union workers out on the street. But the workers, long aware that Brynwood Partners might try to shut down the facility, say they have come too far to leave without a final fight. Read more.
