http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8507066.stm

What the hell is happening to the U.K???

I feel sorry for the cadbury workers in Keynsham.

Yeah. The ink on the deal is barely dry and the cuts begin.

If we keep exporting jobs at the rate we have been, its going to get even messier. If thats possible.

I am truely sorry for those workers.

S.

Got to warrant a boycott?

It was already agreed, and we do need to give all those now unemployed Polish builders that took our construction jobs work now.

Lets all boycott Cadburys then.

That would be that there global capitalism for you. If you want winners, there have to be losers…..

Welcome to living a market economy. Hands up who owns a bike that the frame is built overseas and has non-UK made components on it.

What did they exactly make at that particular factory? Please tell me its not creme eggs. But seriously, wot genesis and crikey said.

EDIT:

Products made at Somerdale include Fry's Chocolate Cream, the Double Decker, Dairy Milk, Chocolate Buttons,Creme Eggs and Mini Eggs, Cadbury's Fudge, Chomp and the Crunchie.

Nooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Most of Cadburys chocolate tastes terrible anyway , Bournville is only just palatable. But it is crap for them to suggest before the sale is agreed that the jobs will be safe only to u-turn a couple of weeks later.

So Kraft have confirmed they are closing a plant that was going to be closed anyway?

Seems like bit of a non-story that will be hyped to the max.

ha ha – they're Americans – did you really think they would do anything else ?

Yeah. The ink on the deal is barely dry and the cuts begin.

Shall we conveniently forget all the cuts that were going on (including 400 back-office staff outsourced to India) before the deal was even proposed?

I take it all the people so upset about this had bought Cadburys shares and had their say in how it was run? Or just stuff their faces with Dairy Milk once in a while?

Whatever happened Frys Fruit Creme? A sad loss to confectionary fanciers everywhere.

weren't the major shareholders before craft not of this isle?

As for selling British Manufacturing Greats how about

Rover

LDV

morris

anything else we still make here?

Yeah, a boycott, just what the remaining cadbury employees need. Cadbury had already earmarked the plant for closure, so what you need to do is eat MORE chocolate

Cant we give communism a whirl ?
All the best stuff comes out of manchester , It just takes a while for it to grow on you .
Like the Smiths .
I know the Russians cocked it up a bit , but , we could take their , ' business model ' and give it a tweak . Sex it up for the new millenium .
Of course , there'd still be no chocolate .

Or , whilst were on the subject of Polish builders , we could try that other european business model . Fascism .
I'm sure my Polish mates , the dry liners , would be mortified , but even more gutted would be my fat, but otherwise healthy , anglo saxon neighbour who hasnt worked for 20 yrs being told he has to bulid his own school .

I think the double whammy of that + no chocolate , would be too much .
I just cant go on .

But isn't the ultimate extrapolation of a free market that one day it will be run by one corporation?

Was going to happen anyway before the take over so it's a bit of a storm in a tea cup. I would expect more cuts though.

Cadburys gone, what next

Sturmey-Archer?

Oh poo, they went years ago.

Given that the Cadbury was (a) merged with Schweppes and (b) floated in 1969 it's fair to say that any idea that this was the same business that started out in 1824 is nonsense.

Public companies are, by their very nature, subject to takeovers, whether recommended or not. This one was recommended, which tells me that the board evidently decided that Kraft's acquisition was in the best interest of the company and the shareholders.

If you don't want public companies to be subject to acquisition by ocverseas interests, buy enough shares that you have to make your own rule 9 offer….

http://www.greenandblacks.com/uk/home.html 😀

I don't like Kraft, but like all the other posters have said, all they've done here is stick to the plan that had already been announced by the previous "owners".

The thing is, in between, Kraft said the plant would be kept open.

I take it all the people so upset about this had bought Cadburys shares and had their say in how it was run? Or just stuff their faces with Dairy Milk once in a while

Rubbish really. A handful of fund managers were lobbied by Kraft.
This small band of people(possibly less than 10 individuals) holding collosal quantities of shares in Cadbury, made the buy-out happen.

Share owning public never had a chance. But then again, share holders are only out for the returns, aren't they ?.

So by holding Cadbury shares, I couldn't have stopped the take-over.

Fund managers ?, funding peoples pensions…Its a strange system.

If you worked at Cadbury, was just about to retire, AND had a private pension run by one of the Cadbury holding fund managers. Then perhaps the buy-out and subsequent profit for the fund, is in your interest ?.
The profit the fund managers make from the sale of Cadbury, and return to the fund, is used to pay-out your pension.

Question though. If we keep exporting our jobs….whos going to be earning, in order to buy anything ?.
Cadbury was a UK employer and a global exporter, bringing in money from abroad, generating primary wealth. This could then be re-distributed within our economy, etc, through the channels of wages, taxation, retail consumption.

The Gov goes on about how the UK invent brands, build them up and then sell them on, and that we could still do this now. But this doesn't happen over night, as mentioned above, Cadbury had been around since the early 19th Century, ending up a "blue-Chip" FTSE 100 company by the time it was deemed attractive enough for Kraft to borrow 7 Billion from….RBS to fund the buy-out.
And all this against Mr Buffet's better judgement.
Can we really "back-fill" the gaps left in UK industry when a successful UK company is sold overseas. As quickly as we are disposing of them into foriegn hands, who, like Kraft, will probably chase the potential for reducing the manufacturing costs by moving ops abroad and leaving UK workers to sign-on.

Oh, I dont have the answer, look at this stuff for too long and you see how messy it gets. I just can't help thinking its a shame that people will be out of work because of this. And for those pointing out that the facory was going to be closed anyway. Well, perhaps that was because it was an easier choice for the directors than to decide to search for a way of keeping it open ?…When you run several factories and one isn't doing so well. You have more choices than just selling the entire company.
Well, if you own the company, that is.

S.

http://www.greenandblacks.com/uk/home.html

What about them:
1)They're owned by Cadbury's / Kraft foods.
2)They make expensive chocolate that isn't even as good quality as dairy milk (kind of chalky, yuck), and isn't fair trade (except for maya gold).

This is what happens when consumers decide they want cheap stuff rather than domestically made stuff. If you're concerned, think about what you buy, and attempt to ensure as much as what you pay over the counter stays in the UK.

Most countries in the world hostile takeovers are not possible because of legislation.

Cadbury will now be asset stripped and destroyed as it is competition for Kraft.

Cadbury will now be asset stripped and destroyed as it is competition for Kraft.

Except it's not. Kraft, prior to this take over, didn't have any chocolate brands and Cadbury is a ready made brand that they can use to grow their business in the US should they choose to. Destroying Cadbury makes no sense whatsoever.

Mergers and take overs do not always result in asset stripping.

I bet this one does. Kraft have a lot of chocolate manufacture

http://www.kraftfoods.co.uk/kraft/page?siteid=kraft-prd&locale=uken1&PagecRef=483&Mid=483

This is what happens when consumers decide they want cheap stuff rather than domestically made stuff. If you're concerned, think about what you buy, and attempt to ensure as much as what you pay over the counter stays in the UK.

CaptJon.

Very well put, imo. Totally agree.

Not always easy though in todays "globalized" world, loads of stuff sold cheap in the UK, imported from abroad. Leaving us more of our wages to spend on over priced homes ?….
🙂

S.

Have future unemployed workers spat in the chocolate yet?

Glad I'm on a diet now!

damned yanks
damned Poles
damned choccy eaters
damned capitalism
damned globalisation
damned annoying

LOL at Zaskar

Brilliant. Guess I'm on that diet too now.

🙂

Mike
Don't forget
"Damned Idiots"
……

S.

The cuts have already started, it amazes me that they, Kraft, have waited to see how the Cadbury setup as it stands pans out.
Makes you wonder if the Cadbury directors etc were that resistant to change?

Boycott fat people!

"Yeah. The ink on the deal is barely dry and the cuts begin."

I know it's already been said, but nobody seemed to pay the slightest bit of attention, this is a cut that was announced in 2007. Describing this as "beginning cuts" is just silliness tbh.