Heinz layoffs affect 600 workers in US, Canada

Heinz layoffs announced in wake of review of operations. Heinz layoffs represent nearly a tenth of the food company's North American workforce.

|
Brendan McDermid/Reuters/File
Traders work at the post that trades H.J. Heinz Co. on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange in February. The world's largest ketchupmaker said on Tuesday it plans to eliminate 600 jobs across North America. The Heinz layoffs follow the $28 billion sale of the company to Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc and private equity firm 3G Capital earlier this year.

Food company H.J. Heinz Co. is eliminating 600 jobs across the U.S. and in Canada, including 350 in Pittsburgh, nearly a third of its operation there, it said Tuesday.

The company was sold in June and the layoffs were the result of a review of operations, spokesman Michael Mullen said. They're intended to enable faster decision-making, increased accountability and accelerated growth, he said.

Mullen said that as part of the transition to a private company, the Heinz leadership "examined every piece of our business to better position Heinz in a very competitive global market" and that review "resulted in a number of difficult but necessary organizational changes."

Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway and the Brazilian investment firm 3G Capital bought the company in a $23.3 billion deal. Bernardo Hees was named Heinz's new CEO. He took over from William Johnson, who received a golden parachute of $56 million, in addition to $156.7 million in vested stock and deferred compensation he accrued over his career.

Heinz is offering severance packages and outplacement services to people who lost jobs, Mullen said.

"We regret the impact this has on Heinz employees and their families," Mullen said.

Mullen said Heinz will remain headquartered in Pittsburgh, where it was founded in 1869. He said that after the reduction the company will employ about 800 people in the Pittsburgh region and 6,000 across North America.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to Heinz layoffs affect 600 workers in US, Canada
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Business/Latest-News-Wires/2013/0813/Heinz-layoffs-affect-600-workers-in-US-Canada
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe