Bakery to close, eliminating 570 jobs

NORTHWEST GLENDALE — The smell of freshly baked bread wafts around Millbrook Bakery on San Fernando Road, but it won’t for long.

That smell — and about 570 jobs — are slated to be eliminated in October, when the bakery, which produces Wonder Bread, is set to close up shop, company spokeswoman Maya Pagoda said.

The bakery is one of four Southern California bakeries owned by Kansas City-based Interstate Bakery Corp. that are slated to close.

Interstate has been operating under Chapter 11 bankruptcy since 2004, and the move is part of an effort to bring the struggling company back into the black, Pagoda said.

“They’re really at a point where they can’t afford to continue to support an unprofitable market,” she said. “It was a difficult decision for the company, but at this point their primary consideration is long-term survival as a whole.”

All told, the pullout of the Southern California bread market will leave 1,300 truck drivers, bakery workers, mechanics and clerks at the company’s dozen retail outlets out of work, she said.

Increased competition from rival producers and changing tastes among consumers are among the factors that have made Southern California an unprofitable market for the company, which also produces Hostess Twinkies and other snack cakes.

In addition to Wonder Bread, the company bakes Millbrook, Roman Meal and Sun-Maid breads. But soon after October, those brands will disappear from Southern California store shelves, Pogoda said.

The good news is that the company will still produce and distribute its sweet snack cake products in Southern California, she said.

But that news hardly consoled Los Angeles resident Mariko Blackburn, who for years has stopped at the Milbrook Bakery’s retail outlet for fresh bread, she said Wednesday outside the shop.

“I heard that they were closing, and I was so upset I just stopped in to buy one thing and say hello,” Blackburn said.

She hailed the Glendale bakery’s retail outlet for its fresh, inexpensive products and the smiling face of the shop’s clerk.

There will be some help locally for those employees.

The Glendale-based Verdugo Jobs Center, which offers services — and sometimes financial assistance through grants — to laid-off employees, has been working with Interstate for a few years, said Don Nakamoto, executive analyst at the center.

The center contacted Interstate management Monday and plans to help the nearly 600 workers that, come Oct. 20, will lose their jobs, he said.

“We’ve been talking to management and looking at setting up different meetings with workers that have been affected,” Nakamoto said.

Typically, the center tries to pair up laid-off workers with new jobs that require similar skills, he said. A grant to provide direct financial assistance could be in the works, he added.

Interstate’s downsize is subject to bankruptcy court approval, which is expected to come at a hearing in October, Pogoda said.

Once the move is approved, the company is likely to sell the four bakery properties, including the Millbrook Bakery, but it has not yet begun to market them, Pogoda said.