NatureSweet Lays Off 65 Employees
San Antonio, TX-
By ANUK Staff
5.8.13
In the wake of its acquisition of EuroFresh Farms, NatureSweet has laid off roughly 65 out of 800 employees at its facility in Wilcox. The figure does not include the 400 inmates formerly utilized by company.
NatureSweet did not announce the reduction in force earlier as it did not take full possession of EuroFresh Farms until the middle of last month, according to CEO Bryant Ambelang, as reported by the Arizona Range News.
“We were ‘debtor in possession’. So we weren’t making any personnel decisions at that time,”Ambelang said. He expressed a desire to handle the situation behind closed doors rather that have employees “read about it in the newspaper.”
“We wanted to treat these people like human beings.”
Layoffs took place mostly in management and administration, noted Ambelang. He said that EuroFresh Farms CEO Johan van den Berg was no longer with the company.
The sale of almost all of EuroFresh’s assets to NatureSweet’s subsidiary, Zona Acquisition LLC., was approved on March 23 by the Arizona United States Bankruptcy Court.
Ambelang indicated that the company is looking at reducing the amount of inmate labor, who work in harvesting.
“We are having ongoing conversations with the prison. Is there a role for the prison going forward? That’s what we’re trying to determine,” said Ambelang.
