Twinkies Go Bankrupt
Sad news, factory-made baked-good lovers: Hostess, the maker of Twinkies, is filing for bankruptcy -- but it isn't so much because Americans don't find Twinkies delicious anymore. The Wall Street Journal tries to parse out the reasons Hostress needs Chapter 11 protection, which it will file for this week. People losing their appetite for Twinkies is only a slight problem -- Twinkie sales have only declined a slight 2 percent while sales of its cupcakes and other baked goods have remained flat. So we still find those suggestively oblong cream-filled cakes delicious. The Journal says it has more to so with how all the loving hands that go into making them have gotten pricier. "The privately held Irving, Texas, company, which employs roughly 19,000 people and carries more than $860 million in debt, has been facing a cash squeeze amid high labor costs and rising prices for sugar, flour and other ingredients, according to people familiar with the matter," The Journal reports. But don't fret about Twinkies going away forever. The company had to go through a similar Chapter 11 restructuring from 2004 to 2009, but continued to make their golden-baked snacks.
