Baking&Snack - April 2013 - 14

Hostess Brands’ saga coming to an end
While Hostess Brands’ bakeries will play a
part in the future of Flowers Foods’ bakeries, Allen Shiver, Flowers president, suggested the shuttered plants should reopen
gradually — dictated by market demand.
Mr. Shiver commented on the pending
Hostess acquisition during an investor’s
day presentation in March. Flowers is paying $360 million for 20 baking plants, 38
depots and five bread/roll brands, including Wonder, Merita, Home Pride, Nature’s
Pride and Butternut.
Mr. Shiver didn’t offer specifics about reintroducing Wonder and brands into the marketplace. Rather, he said the acquired brands

would be offered initially in existing Flowers
markets. The company would then consider
plant re-openings as it expands geographically.
For many years, he noted, Flowers has
pursued a “methodical” expansion into
new regions. His remarks shed little light
on Flowers’ plans to reopen Hostess plants
in existing markets. Those facilities include
Jacksonville and Orlando, FL.; Alexandria,
LA.; Rocky Mount, NC; and Knoxville and
Memphis, TN.
In other Hostess news, C. Dean
Metropoulos, founder and CEO of
Metropoulos and Co., will serve as CEO of
the Hostess cake business to be acquired by

HB Holdings, which is paying $410 million
for the assets of the majority of the snack
cake business. The assets include Hostess and
Dolly Madison branded products as well as
five bakeries and certain equipment. The new
owners are hoping to re-launch Twinkies and
other snack cakes by this summer.
Additionally, affiliates of Grupo Bimbo,
Mexico City, will pay $31.9 million for the
Beefsteak bread brand. Other Hostess deals
were still awaiting federal bankruptcy court
approval as of the magazine’s deadline.
Visit www.bakingbusiness.com for all of
the latest news concerning Hostess Brands.
— Milling & Baking News

Popularity of gluten-free diets hits record high
Nearly one-third of US consumers say
they want to reduce or eliminate gluten in
their diets, according to The NPD Group,
Chicago. This is the highest level since
NPD began asking the question in 2009.
“It’s not that we want health and wellness
more but that we are constantly changing

how we address health and wellness,” said
Harry Balzer, NPD’s chief industry analyst. “A
generation ago, health was about avoiding fat,
cholesterol, sugar and sodium in our diet.
While those desires still exist for many, they
no longer are growing concerns. Today, increasingly, more of us want to avoid gluten in

our diet, and right now it is nearly 30% of the
adult population, and it’s growing.”
In restaurants, the number of consumers ordering gluten-free or wheat-free labeled food
has more than double what it was compared
to four years ago, representing more than 200
million restaurant visits in the past year.

O’Reilly, Favre, Brown to highlight IDDBA show
Former quarterback great Brett
Favre and Fox News Channel
commentator Bill O’Reilly top
the list of speakers at this year’s
International Dairy-Deli-Bakery
Association’s show, which will
be held June 2-4 in Orlando, FL.
The theme for the show is Foodie
All-Stars.
O’Reilly
The annual event will attract
hundreds of exhibitors, including wholesale
bakeries, pizza manufacturers and snack
producers that target the supermarket instore bakery and deli as well as the foodservice and convenience store channels.
Additional speakers include the
Food Network’s Alton Brown, who will

/ Baking & Snack / April 2013

talk about “Feasting
on Foodies: TV Food
Shows and Their Impact.”
Lowell Catlett, PhD, professor and dean at New
Mexico State University,
will stare into a crystal
ball and focus on unimaginable trends in his
presentation on “Food:
Seeing 20-20 in 2020.”
Carol Christison, IDDBA’s executive director, will make her annual unorthodox
observations about consumer attitudes,
buying patterns and the mini- and megatrends that are reshaping in-store bakeries.
For more information, visit www.iddba.org.

Brown

www.bakingandsnack.com

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Baking&Snack - April 2013

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